


i've kissed you before but i didn’t do it right

by psycheDahlia



Series: mitskiverse [1]
Category: Game Grumps
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Bedroom Sex, Begging, Boys Kissing, Breakfast, Coming In Pants, Complete, Cooking, Dirty Talk, Domestic Fluff, Drinking, Dry Humping, Falling In Love, First Kiss, First Time Bottoming, Flirting, Forehead Kisses, Friends to Lovers, Frottage, Grinding, Hotels, Hurt/Comfort, Inappropriate Erections, Kissing Games, Lap Sex, Light Crossdressing, Lipstick & Lip Gloss, Literal Sleeping Together, Love Bites, Love Confessions, M/M, Masturbation, Morning After, Neck Kissing, Nipple Play, Platonic Kissing, Polyfidelity, Possessive Sex, Post-Coital Cuddling, Public Display of Affection, Rain, Requited Love, Sex Games, Sharing Clothes, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, Swimming Pools, Truth or Dare, boys wearing crop tops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2020-04-24 21:10:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 32,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19181431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psycheDahlia/pseuds/psycheDahlia
Summary: "can i try again, try again, try again?and again and again and again?"(a slow burn, kiss-centric egobang fic)





	1. i glow pink in the night in my room

**Author's Note:**

> work title, chapter titles, and lyrics in summary all come from the insanely beautiful song "pink in the night" by mitski

Stepping outside after fourteen straight hours of recording feels like waking up from a dream. The cool summer breeze feels like heaven. They both just stand there for a moment, breathing in the evening air.

The setting sunlight gives Dan’s hair a coppery tinge, and the wind blows his mess of curls right into Arin’s face when Dan hugs him goodbye. He can feel the bumps of Dan’s ribcage beneath one hand, the bumps of his spine beneath the other. He thinks “you’re too skinny, I love you, your hair is getting in my mouth” all as one thought somehow and buries his nose against the shoulder of Dan’s well-worn dark blue t-shirt.

Dan leans back but not entirely away, his hands still resting on Arin’s back, just above his waist. A soft, fond look crosses Dan’s face. He leans forward and presses a quick, chaste kiss to Arin’s forehead.

“Drive safe,” he says quietly, even though there’s no one else around. “Text me when you get home.”

“I will,” Arin promises, and there’s a lump forming in his throat, even though he’s going to see Dan again first thing tomorrow. “You too.” 

 

 


	2. i've been blossoming alone over you

“That was terrible,” Arin groans. “This was a terrible idea.”

“Aw, you didn’t have any fun at my party?” Dan pouts. He’s kneeling on the floor next to the bed Arin's lying on, working at the laces on Arin’s shoes.

“I did,” Arin concedes. “I was more referring to going drink for drink with Matt. That kid might be tiny, but he can…” Arin pauses to burp. “Drink. He can drink.”

“You shouldn’t have let Ryan pour for you guys,” Dan remarks. “He was definitely overpouring for you. _Both_ of you, but you especially.”

“Man, I knew he was cheating, that fuckin…” Arin burps again, louder this time. “Oof. Fuckin’ cheatin’...cheater.”

“Uh-oh,” Dan says, glancing up at him worriedly. “That was two big burps right in a row. You got the pukies? Don’t hurl on my bed, dude. I love you, but...please.”

“No pukies,” Arin promises. “Belchies only.”

“Okay, well, if belchies turn into pukies, there’s a wastebasket right here.” Dan thumps the plastic bin with the back of his knuckles. “You see where it is, Ar?”

“Yeah,” Arin replies, not looking anywhere near that vicinity, just keeping his eye on the dull white ceiling of Dan’s bedroom. “Hey, can you turn the ceiling fan off? It’s making me dizzy.”

“It’s not on,” Dan giggles. “You just got the spins.” He pulls each of Arin’s shoes off in turn and drops them on the floor with a thud, then wrinkles his nose. “Yikes, buddy. I’m getting you some shoe deodorant next time I’m at a Walgreens.”

“Shoe deodorant,” Arin giggles.

“What?” Dan asks, raising his eyebrows. “It’s a thing, dude.”

“No, I know it is, but I’m just picturing, like.” Arin has to stop to laugh to himself. “Like a shoe, and it’s like…” He lifts up each of his arms and mimes putting on deodorant. “And its laces are the little arms, and…”

“Alright, man,” Dan grins. “Are you good? Cuz I gotta go drive Suzy home if you’re crashing here.”

“Nooooo,” Arin whines. “Stay.”

“You want Suzy to stay here with you?” Dan asks. “I dunno, dude. I can ask her, but she kept saying how much she missed her bed…”

“Not her,” Arin clarifies. “You. Don’t leave me all alone, Dan.” He pouts dramatically. “I’ve got the spinnies.”

Dan looks down at him for a moment. “You’re such a big baby sometimes.” He pushes Arin’s hair back off his sweaty forehead, bites his lower lip for a moment, and then sighs, but it’s an affectionate sigh. “Okay, fine. Wait here.”

After Dan leaves, Arin sprawls out as far as he can across Dan’s bed. He’s pretty sure it’s the same size as the one he’s got back home, but aside from sharing it with Suzy, Mochi, and Mimi, they’ve also got no less than twelve random assorted pillows, heaps of blankets, and a wide variety of stuffed animals on their bed at all times. Dan’s bed is far more simple - two pillows, one comforter, and a fitted sheet, all in a psychedelic two-tone blue tie-dye pattern. It feels massive and empty and the blue reminds Arin of water, and makes him feel like he’s floating in the middle of the ocean. A spinning ocean. Fuck. Where was that bin again?

“Okay!” Dan’s voice returns, making Arin feel immediately more grounded and less nauseated. “So I managed to catch Barry literally in the process of grabbing a beer out of the fridge and asked him to drive Suzy home. He put the beer back looking all, like, sad and shit. It was hilarious.” Dan giggles to himself as he sits down on the edge of the bed. “He says you owe him a beer the next time we all go out, but don’t worry, I’ll cover it for you.”

“I can do it,” Arin protests. “I have, like...money.” He grabs Dan’s hand, tugs until Dan finally lies down next to him. “C’mere.”

“Are you okay?” Dan asks, lying on his side facing him. “Not gonna barf, are you?”

“No,” Arin promises. “I’m okay. I just need someone with me. To hold onto.”

Still holding onto Arin’s hand, Dan gently brushes his lips over Arin's knuckles. The pure sweetness of it makes Arin’s heart thump in his chest.

“I’m here, baby bear,” Dan promises him. “Hold on as tight as you want.”

 _'But I can't,'_ Arin thinks to himself, drifting off to drunken slumber. ' _If I held onto you as tightly as I want to, I’d crush your hand into dust.'_


	3. and I hear my heart breaking tonight

“What if you put a marshmallow in your mouth and then I kiss it out like William Tell?” Dan suggests, giggling wildly. “That’s how William Tell worked, right?”

Arin puts a marshmallow in between his lips and turns to Dan expectantly. Dan takes two fingers and swipes it out, sending it flying across the room and then, giggling and grimacing at the same time, wipes Arin’s spit from his fingers onto Arin’s jeans.

Arin shoots a mock-offended look at the camera. “Porque, Maria?" Dan's doubled over in laughter. "C'mon. That was weak. Pussy up, bro." He grabs another marshmallow and puts it between his lips. “Do it right,” he says, slightly muffled.

Dan glances over at Tucker, and by extension the camera. Allie and Hanna are sitting on the couch, both looking at something on Allie’s phone, but hearing the abrupt stop in action, they glance up to see what’s going on.

Rolling his eyes, Dan sticks out his tongue as far as it’ll go. He grabs Arin’s chin between a thumb and forefinger, then, as quickly as possible, leans forward and steals the marshmallow out of Arin’s mouth. Arin feels the warm, wet slide of a tongue against his lips and grips the leg of the table hard, knuckles going white. Dan once told him that his first kiss felt like his heart was exploding. Arin thinks he knows what he meant, now.

The marshmallow gets stuck to Dan’s tongue. He wrinkles his nose in disgust and sets the slightly damp marshmallow onto the table. “That was in Arin’s mouth, so I’m not gonna eat that.”

“Your tongue was just in my mouth,” Arin points out.

“Don’t say it like that!” Dan squeals, laughing hysterically. He glances over at Allie and Hanna, who are definitely watching closely now. “Is that the grossest thing we’ve done, do you think?”

“Maybe if you ate the marshmallow,” Hanna suggests.

“I’m not gonna...oh, no!” Dan cries in disgust as Arin snatches the marshmallow off the table and pops it into his mouth like he was just waiting for permission to do it. “Arin!”

“What?” Arin asks, pushing the half-chewed stickiness to the front of his mouth, making sure to show as much of it as possible to the camera and, by extension, Dan. “Do you want another kiss?” It comes out muffled and garbled and some marshmallow falls out along with the words.

“You are one disgusting creature,” Dan cackles. “I fuckin’ love you.” He pauses. “Now my mouth tastes like popcorn,” Dan remarks. “Is that from you? Why did you taste like popcorn?”

“Because I ate popcorn,” Arin replies.

It’s not even meant to be funny, but for some reason it gets Dan laughing so hard he falls onto Arin’s shoulder. “Mystery solved!” Dan declares. “Tucker, put in some mystery solving music.”

Tucker doesn’t end up having to put in any sort of music, because there’s a solid twenty minutes from that episode that never makes it to air.  “We probably don’t want to spend too much time on any one challenge, i.e. the marshmallow challenge,” Tucker writes in the editor’s notes. “I cut it down to the most relevant moments.”

Arin’s expecting someone, maybe Hanna or Allie, to point out that it was cut out of the episode. Maybe poke a little fun at him about it. But it never gets brought up again. Arin can’t help but remember the way he felt when Dan’s tongue was briefly inside his mouth, remembers grabbing the table leg so hard his knuckles turned white, and wonders if they all know everything he’s not saying.

 


	4. do you hear it too?

It’s no secret that Dan’s a handsome dude, but Arin’s gotten so used to seeing Dan’s face every day, he’s no longer completely caught off guard by it. The subtle shift between Dan Avidan and Danny Sexbang that stage makeup and costuming provides, however, is just enough to remind Arin how lovely Dan truly is, and he’s definitely sort of taken aback.

Some poor, poor soul has obviously had the job of wrangling his curls, and has somehow gotten them all going the same direction, cascading rather artistically over the band tied around Dan’s forehead. His face has been contoured to be even more defined and angular than usual, with a soft dusting of pale glitter brushed delicately across his cheekbones. There's a dash of icy blue glitter across his eyelids that only appears when he catches the light a certain way, a subtle bit of color on his lips to make them look fuller, and dark liner around his eyes making them bigger and brighter, sparkling and glimmering, though Arin’s not sure how much of that is the makeup and how much of it is just Dan’s love of performing shining through.

“So in the last scene we shot,” Dan explains, because Arin’s just gotten there, while Dan’s been there shooting this music video since five that morning, “Lord Eunuch tossed the keys to my cell in his dungeon into a lava pit, so to save me, Ninja Brian grabbed a portal gun off the wall and fired it under my feet, I fell through a portal and landed in the middle of a dormitory at St. Jezebel’s Reform School for Very Naughty Girls.” He raises his eyebrows at Arin, a suggestive smirk on his lips. “So you can imagine how _that_ turns out.”

“Naughty?” Arin offers.

 _“Very_ naughty,” Dan giggles. “They just got the shot of the girls all running at me, they’re filming a couple shots of the girls lounging around all sexy in their dorm before I get there and then they’re gonna get the shot of the girls running at the camera, and then they’ll be ready for me again.”

“Yeah?” Arin asks, uncapping a tube of lipstick, peering down at it, and then replacing the cap and setting it back on the table. “What’s your next scene?”

“I stumble out of the dormitory, all disheveled and covered in, like, lipstick kisses and looking all dazed as shit,” Dan explains, “Ninja Brian swoops down in the enemy ship, which is full of dead villains he killed offscreen because he’s Ninja Brian. I clear my throat, fix my clothes, hop on board, and then we just fly off into the horizon, cuz that’s where this video ends. We’re hoping to make it sort of a trilogy with the other two singles off this album and continue the story in the next video.”

“Gotcha,” Arin nods. “Well shit, dude, I’m sorry I’m so late. Seems like you’re just about wrapping up.”

“It’s cool,” Dan shrugs. “There were a lot of reshoots and pausing to move stuff around, you would’ve been super fuckin’ bored through most of it.” He spins around lazily in the makeup chair. “Right now I’m just waiting for the makeup lady to come paint some kisses on me.”

“Bad news, buddy,” Brian says, walking up suddenly behind them. “Sharona went home early. Hi, Arin.”

“Aw man,” Dan frowns as Arin gives Brian a wave. "That kinda blows. I can mess up my own hair, but I can’t kiss myself.” He giggles to himself. “Believe me, I’ve tried.”

“That’s very sad,” Brian states flatly. “Can’t _we_ just draw them on you? How hard is it to draw lips?” He picks up a tube of lipstick, grabs Dan’s arm, and makes an attempt. It comes out looking more like a mutant butterfly.

“Pretty fuckin' hard, apparently,” Dan snorts.

Brian shrugs, grabs a makeup remover wipe and cleans the red mark off Dan’s arm in one quick swipe. “Whatever, you try it then. If you can’t figure it out, it’s not a huge deal. We have the shot of them all swarming you, and then the name of the school is shown on screen. I think the audience will pick up on the implication with you just looking sort of disheveled and dazed.”

“I guess,” Dan concedes.

“I’ve gotta go call Audrey,” Brian states. He gives Arin a light thump on the arm. “Good to see you, man. Glad you made it out to set.”

“Yeah, man, good to see you too,” Arin calls after him. He glances back at Dan, who’s just finished applying the bright red lipstick to his own mouth and is now pressing his lips to his arm.

He leans back and admires his handiwork. “There we go,” Dan remarks, nodding. “That looks pretty good.”

“Yeah,” Arin agrees, “but you’re not gonna be able to reach, like…” He gestures at Dan’s general chest area. “Any of that.”

“Ugh, I know,” Dan frowns. It’s kind of comical, with the smeared red lipstick and all, but also a look of pretty genuine disappointment, which hits Arin right in the gut. “Fuck. I had a really vivid idea in mind of how it should look, but maybe Brian’s right. Maybe we’ll just skip the lipstick marks.”

He reaches for a makeup wipe, but Arin stops him. “Give it here,” he says. When Dan, confused, hands him the container of makeup wipes, Arin rolls his eyes. “No, ya doof. The lipstick. I’ll get the spots you can’t reach.”

Dan quickly brightens. “Really?” he cries. “Oh, shit, dude, you’re the fuckin’ best. I fucking love you.”

He wipes the red from his lips, hands over the tube of lipstick, and then shrugs one arm out of the Sexbang outfit, leaving half his chest exposed. “Okay, so I’m thinking it’ll be like this on this side, like I’m half out of it, and then on this side I’ll…” He tugs the strap of the tank top midway down his bicep. “Like this. Yeah?”

Arin pauses in applying the lipstick to glance over at him. “Yeah, looks good,” he states, then smacks his lips together the way he’s seen Suzy do when she’s applying lipstick.

“Cool,” Dan grins. “Okay, just scatter a few across my chest, maybe a couple on my neck, and a couple on my face. Is that cool?”

“Yeah, whatever you need, man,” Arin agrees. He sets the lipstick back onto the counter and then crouches down, practically looming over the chair that Dan’s sitting in.

“You ready?” Arin asks. Dan swallows kind of hard, but covers it up with a smile and a quick nod.

Arin scans Dan’s pale chest for the right spot to put the first kiss. He settles on just below his collarbone. Keeping his hands on the arms of the chair for balance, he leans in and presses his lips firmly to the skin. In trying to keep his facial hair out of the way, the kiss ends up being a little bit more open-mouthed than he expected it to be, but it winds up being a happy accident. When he leans away, there’s a perfect lip print left behind.

“What do you think?” Arin asks, standing up.

Dan looks in the mirror and grins. “It’s perfect,” he cries. “Thanks, man.”

“Sure,” Arin replies, shrugging. “Let me do a few more.”

“Yeah,” Dan agrees. Arin presses one kiss lower on his chest, one towards the center, and one right at the hollow of his throat. Dan tilts his head back on that one, seemingly on instinct, and Arin uses the change in angle to kiss the side of his neck, too, right near the pulse point.

That one comes out a little bit faded, though, so Arin reaches for the lipstick again. “Gotta reapply,” he explains, but Dan stops him.

“Use this one,” Dan instructs, handing him a different tube. “I want a couple different colors, y’know, like the kisses came from different girls?”

“Gotcha,” Arin says. He wipes the red onto the back of his hand and then leans toward the mirror to apply a new coat of hot pink. “Ooh, I like this color.”

“It suits you,” Dan remarks.

“Thank you for the compliment, kind sir,” Arin says, and then leans in and kisses him on the cheek. He then gently tilts Dan’s head to press a kiss just below his ear, which gets an actual gasp out of Dan.

“Sorry,” Dan says, flushing slightly, visible even through all the makeup. “I’m sensitive there.”

“Noted,” Arin remarks. When he glances back down at Dan’s chest, he notices that Dan’s nipples have gone hard. “Oh, wow. _Very_ noted.” He flicks playfully at the hardened little bud, relishing Dan’s startled squeak. “You want one here?”

“Ow!” Dan cries.

“That didn’t hurt,” Arin insists.

“It didn’t,” Dan admits. “It just surprised me. Yeah, put one there. It makes sense.”

“Really?” Arin raises his eyebrows. “I was kind of kidding.”

“I mean,” Dan puts his hands up like he’s being arrested. “You definitely don’t have to, but I did kind of picture one there, and…”

Arin leans forward, circling his lips so the print will be perfectly surrounding the rosy pink nipple. Of course, that leaves Dan’s nipple pressed right to the damp insides of Arin’s lips, and the immediate urge to _lick_ is almost overwhelming. Arin’s absolutely replaying the startled little squeak Dan let out, wondering if Dan would make that same sound if he licked his nipple, or if it’d be closer to the moans Suzy lets out when Arin licks hers, or…

Anyway, Arin doesn’t end up doing it, more out of cowardice than anything else, but when Arin leans back, Dan’s cheeks are as pink as Arin thinks they would be if he had. He presses three more kisses in quick succession in random spots all over Dan’s chest, and then leans back again, looking Dan straight in the face. Dan is breathing heavily, lips parted, looking right at him. Arin doesn’t dare look down at the tight Spandex covering Dan’s lap, but he’s pretty sure he knows Dan well enough to know what he’d see if he did.

Arin leans forward. Dan’s eyes slip closed, the blue glitter on them catching the overhead fluorescents. Arin presses one final kiss to Dan’s forehead, just above his eyebrow scar. Then stands up fully and spins Dan’s chair around. Dan’s eyes flutter open in surprise.  

“What do you think?” Arin asks. Dan takes in his appearance and blushes even darker. "Oh, right.” Arin reaches forward and messes up Dan’s hair, tousling the curls gently with his fingers. “There you go. You look pretty sexed up now, huh?”

“I feel pretty sexed up…” Dan giggles, biting his lip. "Uh, Arin..."

“Hey, you figured it out!” Brian cries, once again coming up abruptly behind them. “The set is all clear of the sexy schoolgirls, so they’re ready for us.”

“That’s such a sad sentence,” Dan giggles, hopping up to follow him. “‘There are no more sexy girls here, so you guys can come back.’ Like oh, thanks.”

“The world is truly cruel to you,” Brian stoically remarks. “And you’re more than welcome to come and watch, Arin. There’s a nice little viewing room with snacks and everything!” Gesturing in a circle around his mouth, Brian quietly adds, “You might want to fix your makeup first, though. Your lipstick is a little smudged.”

“Thanks,” Arin replies, wiping it on the back of his hand and speaking slightly louder to be heard over Dan’s giggling. “Thanks for that.”

After the music video is posted to Youtube, one particularly eagle-eyed commenter points out that some of the kiss marks look as though they were made by someone with facial hair. “ _The pink one by his nipple especially,_ ” they insist. _“Look at it! You can definitely tell.”_

 _“Probs just from the brush they used to paint them on him,_ ” another commenter replies. _“It’s not like someone actually was kissing his chest.”_

The moment Arin sees the last comment, he can't help but reply. _“Of course not!!! That would be crazy!!!!”_

Then four lines of blank space, followed by: _“....but on an unrelated note, did you know Dan’s chest tastes like sweet delicious candy????”_

He gets replies on that comment chain for weeks, of course, but it only takes Dan two hours to fire back with, _“yeah guys dont be silly."_  
  
Then four lines of blank space, followed by: _"unrelated note: it is very hard to hide a boner in spandex”_


	5. it's like a summer shower

“I’m going to murder. I’m absolutely...I’m just going to murder. I’m going to commit a goddamn murder, Dan. I think I’m really going to…” He pauses, breath hitching in his throat as it looks like he gets it, then he falls right back down and lets out a long, distraught groan of, “ _Muuuuuuurrrrrrrder._ ”

“Angel. Baby. Sweet, buttery, bread biscuits.” Dan cycles through accents and inflections at random, mostly just to entertain himself. He’s bubbling with laughter but trying, only semi-successfully, to hold it in to avoid distracting Arin. “Sugar plum, you have _got_ this.”

“I have _not_ got this, have you seen how many times I... _murder,”_ Arin hisses, tumbling off the edge once again. “I’m going to _murder,_ Dan.”

“I don’t like you saying my name right after the word ‘murder,’” Dan admits. “Like, I get the context, but…”

“I’m gonna _murder,_ Dan,” Arin says. “I’m gonna murder _Dan._ I’m _gonna_ murder, Dan. _I’m_ gonna murder, Dan? _I’m_ gonna murder _Dan?_ ” He bites his lip, makes the jump, and misses. “Fuck! Stop distracting me!”

“I was just sitting here!” Dan cries. “You were the one cycling through the many different ways to threaten to murder me.” He can’t help but let a couple giggles escape on that one. “Have you tried that platform up there, the uh, the squiggly one?”

“I would love to try the squiggly one, Dan,” Arin replies. “Tell me, uh, tell me how to fuckin’ get to it, and I’ll…”

“Okay, okay,” Dan puts his hands up in defense, giggling harder. “Put the sass away, I’m only asking.”

“Bro, if you don’t think… _fuck.”_

“I, in fact, almost constantly think ‘fuck.’”

“In like a…” Arin stops speaking for a moment to focus on the game, then resumes. “Like an angry upsetty kinda way, or just like, ‘oh, man, I wanna _fuck.’”_

“Oh, definitely the latter,” Dan clarifies. “You know me, man. I’m uh, a pretty chill and easygoing dude.”

“Shit! Fuck!” Arin screams, throwing up his hands as he falls on the exact same jump. “It’s fucking impossible. It’s _impossible.”_

“You are _not_ a chill and easygoing dude,” Dan notes, laughter in his voice. “You are one upsetty spaghetti.”

“I’m chill and easygoing!” Arin screams. Dan absolutely loses it at that, tumbling into Arin’s shoulder laughing hysterically.

“You’re like a dad on a bad family vacation,” Dan snorts, then puts on a mock-angry voice: “‘We’re having fun! We’re having a good time! No one is angry! No one is sad!’”

“I am _not_ having fun,” Arin replies huffily. “I am _not_ having a good time. I _am_ angry. I _am_ sad.”

“Aww,” Dan giggles. “Don’t be sad, dude. I don’t like it when you’re sad.”

“This game is being such a dick to me, Dan,” Arin whines. “Make it _stop.”_

Dan puts on a childish, whiny voice and wails, “Mo- _om!_ The game’s cheating! Make it play fair!” He furrows his brow. “Wait…” Abruptly sitting bolt upright, Dan grabs Arin’s arm. “Dude, wait, I was right! It is the squiggly one!”

“I can’t get over there,” Arin insists. “I tried, it’s not…”

“No, no, no, dude,” Dan interrupts. “Look, look.” He’s halfway off the couch, leaning forward. “Look over there, see that moving platform? If you just wait, I think it comes over here.”

“I don’t think so, it only…” Arin lets out a sudden cry of joy. “Oh my god, you’re right! It’s coming over here!”

“Yes!” Dan exclaims. “Okay, just hop onto it, and…”

Arin hops onto the floating platform, his character turning around to orient himself. “Okay, and the squiggly one is…”

“Right up over there, dude, it’s heading right for it!” Dan cries.

Arin lands the jump, races along the platform, and, with three more easy jumps, he’s finally finished the level. His victory scream echoes throughout the studio. “Yes!” he cries. “Yes! Oh _fuck_ yes! Dan, I have never loved you more! Oh my _god!”_

He throws his arms around Dan’s shoulders, pulling him in tight against his chest. “Dan! Thank you! Ah, god, you beautiful fuckin’ video game genius, come here!” He lays a barrage of quick, dry kisses all over Dan’s face, kissing his eyelids, his forehead, his cheeks, his nose, his chin, everywhere but his mouth.

“Ah, dude!” Dan cries, shaking with laughter. “You’re welcome, you’re welcome, now please stop!” He wraps his arms around Arin, patting him on the back and resting a hand on the back of his head. 

Arin nuzzles at his cheek. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry!” Dan looks up at Arin, cheeks pink, and points out, “You’re the one who said to get you to the squiggly one, I just kept an eye out for a way to get there! I’m not sure that’s worth kissing me over!”

“You’re the one who saw the squiggly thing to begin with!” Arin reminds him. “I didn’t even listen to you! I wasn’t being like ‘oh, we should do that, just find a way’; I said that to be flippant! I was being a sassmaster!”  
  
“You’re right,” Dan admits. “Actually, if anything, I deserve _more_ kisses.” He squeals in horror as Arin immediately begins kissing his face again. “Ah! Arin! I was kidding! Stop! _Stop!”_


	6. with every drop of rain singing

They’re all at some weird bar that Vernon insisted they go to. Arin would call it a theme bar, but he’s not quite sure what the theme is supposed to be beyond just piles of weird stuff, everywhere, and not a lot of lighting. They’re sat around a table made from an industrial spool, sitting on a wide assortment of chairs ranging from Dan’s tufted-back chair that wouldn’t look out of place in a fancy dining room to the distinctly very 80s overstuffed recliner Allie made an immediate beeline for, to the shitty metal stool poor Brent ended up in by virtue of arriving a few minutes later than everyone else and getting the last choice. Arin and Suzy are sharing Suzy’s favorite, a cute bench made to look like it was carved from a log that in actuality is distinctly made of plastic, and Dan’s sitting to Arin’s right, sipping on a Pepsi and glancing thoughtfully around at the bar’s bizarre decorations.

Dan abruptly interrupts a spirited debate between Brian and Brent as to who the upside-down inverted-color painting above their table is meant to be of (Brent’s insistent it’s Bob Seger, Brian’s adamant it’s Chuck Mangione) to remark, seemingly apropos of nothing, “Y’know, I’ve still never kissed a guy. I really should do that.”

Arin briefly tastes marshmallow on his tongue, thinks of arguing, decides against it. It’s not the first time Dan’s brought up his lifelong lack of real guy-kissing experience, but it’s the first time he’s said it with the implication that he has a desire to actually do it, and Arin doesn’t want to interrupt before he sees where this goes.

Brian, however, doesn’t even blink twice before remarking, “Always sucks to forget an item on your to-do list.”

“I didn’t _forget,_ ” Dan insists. “I just haven’t yet.”

“Do you _want_ to kiss a guy?” Barry asks.

“Yeah!” Dan replies, shrugging. He pauses, seeming to consider it. “Well, no. I mean, I don’t _want to,_ want to. Or, y’know, I don’t want to, like, make a habit of it. Not because I’m, like, against the idea of it,” he amends quickly. “But. Y’know. I mostly just like ladies.”

“But you _do_ want to kiss a dude,” Arin’s asking, but it’s barely stated as a question, it’s said more like a statement that he’s waiting to see Dan’s reaction to.

“I dunno, I just think I should,” Dan replies. He glances over at Arin, the bar lights making his dark eyes sparkle. “I mean, don’t you think I should?”

“I think you should do what you want,” Arin tells him honestly. “It’s not really up to me.” He’s not sure where this is going, but he’ll support Dan on whatever he wants to do, whatever he’s going through. He hopes Dan knows that.

“But you could help!” It’s Suzy who points that out, leaning forward past Arin to look Dan directly in the face. “Do you want Arin to kiss you, Dan?”

Dan’s sparkling eyes go wide and round. His flushed face is tinted bright blue by a neon sign on the wall beside him. “I...I’m, I mean, I’m...” Dan stammers, glancing between Suzy and Arin rapidly and then briefly looking over at Brian, for some reason, before finally settling his gaze solidly on Arin’s face. “Is that...would you be down for that?”

“Sure,” Arin says, acting as if it’s a spur of the moment decision that he hasn’t really had time to think about, “but it’s still not up to me, dude.”

“Well, who’s it up to, then?” Dan asks, leaning past Arin. “Suzy?”

“I don’t know about that, but it’s definitely fine by me,” Suzy replies. “I wouldn’t have brought it up if it wasn’t.” She gives Dan a fond smile. “I think it’s sweet. Arin should _totally_ be your first guy kiss. It should be someone who really loves you.” She looks up at Arin, smiling warmly at him. “I wish he could’ve been mine. He’s a great kisser.”

“I wasn’t when I was fifteen,” Arin reminds her. “I think I drooled on you our first kiss.”

“You did,” Suzy agrees, giggling. “I thought it was cute. You were so nervous.” She looks back over at Dan. “He’s _much_ better now. He hasn’t drooled on me in ages.”

“Well, with that glowing recommendation, how can I resist?” Dan’s laughing, but he’s got a definite nervous buzz to him. “You feelin’ romantic, dude? You down for kissing me?”

“Always,” Arin grins, but then it fades. “Are you sure you want it to be me, though? I mean, just because Suzy said it doesn’t mean that you…”

“Of course,” Dan says quickly. “I always…” He falters, but seeing Arin still looking at him expectantly he hesitantly continues, “I mean, if it was gonna be anyone, I kinda thought…”

“Excuse me,” Brent pipes in from across the table. “Not to interrupt. But if man-on-man kissing is going to happen, can it happen soon? Not sure if you’ve noticed, but you really brought this table’s discussion to a grinding halt. Every time I try and say something, someone shushes me because they’re watching you two.”

“Shh,” Allie hisses, swatting at him lightly.

“We’re watching something,” Barry adds, stealing a fry off Allie’s plate while she’s not looking.

Arin’s not sure how comfortable he is with everyone watching this, but he supposes it could only be even more awkward if it was happening with him and Dan all on their own. Dan keeps looking at him and then shyly averting his eyes, unable to hold his gaze for more than a couple seconds. Poor dude looks about as nervous as Arin’s ever seen him, and suddenly all Arin wants to do is to fix it. He’s pretty sure the only way to fix it is to just kiss him already, and hey, fuck it, he can do that. Dan might not agree, but Arin’s personally pretty solidly convinced that they’ve already done this before anyway.

Arin glances one more at Suzy, who gives him an encouraging nod, before gently taking Dan’s face between his hands. He gives him an encouraging smile. “Don’t be scared,” he tells him.

“I’m not,” Dan insists, even though his hands are slightly shaking. A corner of his mouth twitches up. “I mean. Suzy's right. I’ve waited this long, it should be with someone who really cares about me.” He leans in close, just a hair’s breadth from Arin’s lips. 

“I’m glad it’s you,” Dan murmurs, softly, and then closes the gap.

Arin doesn’t want to kiss him too deeply, especially not right away, but it’s definitely not exactly chaste either. Dan’s hand comes to rest on the back of his head, then, after a few seconds, his other hand lands on Arin’s knee, drawing little circles into the fabric of Arin’s jeans with his thumb. Arin keeps one hand on Dan’s jaw and lets the other card through Dan’s hair, tangling into the curls and then resting on the nape of his neck.  Their mouths move against each other slowly but firmly, easily finding a rhythm as if they’ve kissed countless times before.

Arin hasn’t kissed anyone but Suzy like this in years and years, and as great as this is, the feeling of kissing someone who’s definitely not her is making long-established alarm bells go off in his head. But then, he suddenly feels a hand rest on his back when both of Dan’s are accounted for. A warm, tiny, familiar hand. He smiles into the kiss, feeling extra fond of Suzy in that moment even as his entire body is focused on Dan. Dan smiles back.

The others are almost definitely commenting, but he can’t be bothered to notice. He can’t be bothered to _care_. He and Dan are kissing in the back of a bar and it’s amazing, it’s incredible, it’s everything he never let himself imagine it could be.

Dan finally leans away after what feels simultaneously like forever and way too short of a time, pressing their foreheads together and breathing slightly heavily, a sweet, stupid smile on his face. Arin kind of wants to live in that moment forever.

“You’re right, Suzy,” Dan says when he finally leans back into his own chair, but he doesn’t break eye contact with Arin. “He _is_ a good kisser.” His lips are slightly swollen and his hair is slightly messy and his cheeks are flushed so dark, and Arin did that, Arin did that to him.

Arin’s chest is starting to ache from how hard and fast his heart is beating. He presses a hand to his chest, trying to play it off like he’s just indicating that he’s flattered, but then Dan mirrors the motion and cries, “Oh, dude, same.”

“That tends to happen when you don’t breathe for several minutes,” Brian deadpans. “Come up for air next time, maybe. Save yourselves the chest pains.” Dan buries his laughing face against Arin’s shoulder. Arin wraps an arm around him, rubbing circles on his back.  
  
When their server brings their checks, she’s put Arin, Suzy, and Dan all on the same check and hands it to Arin. “I wasn’t quite sure what was going on with you guys over here,” she admits. _Me either,_  Arin thinks, handing over his card.

Dan’s over at the jukebox with Suzy, trying to burn through the $20 that he didn’t know the machine wouldn’t give him change for. Suzy gets Dan laughing hard and he wraps his arms around her, laughing into her hair. Arin feels so much fondness and warmth for the both of them in that moment that it makes his chest ache all over again.


	7. I love you, I love you, I love you

The fans have been absolutely clamoring for Matt and Ryan to come back to the Power Hour for weeks and weeks now, and Supermega’s schedule has finally opened up to allow it. Arin’s really stoked. As much fun as it is doing shows just with Dan - and it is! - it’s also nice to have some new people around to bounce things off of every once in a while. Not that Matt and Ryan were _new_ people, not exactly, but they worked with Arin rarely enough that he still really did relish every opportunity that he got to do it. Ryan and Matt are so consistently funny, with such a great dynamic between them that balanced well with his and Dan’s, and that meant that videos with the four of them were always just a chill, easy time. And that’s what Arin’s mostly looking for from this session - just a chill, easy time.

Dan’s gone off somewhere private to do vocal warmups, leaving Arin, Matt, and Ryan to pick out what to do for the show. They’ve accumulated quite a collection of potential 10mph activities from a variety of places. There’s stuff Arin had heard of and ordered specifically, a frankly massive amount of gifts from fans, some random stuff Arin had seen in a store and thought might be worth trying, and even a few that had been brought in from various other members of the office staff. There are tons to choose from, and Arin’s mostly just letting Matt and Ryan pick while he stands by and gives a quick synopsis of the ones they point out as looking interesting.

“Oh my god, what is _that?”_   Matt abruptly cries, going up on his toes to reach a thin, dark purple box up on the highest shelf. It’s covered in little drawings: roses, boxes of chocolates, kiss marks, high heels, handcuffs, ball gags, whips...

“Oh, that one was just given to us by some fans on our last tour,” Arin explains. “It’s like, some kind of kinky fuckin’ sex game or some shit.”

“Like, for swingers?” Ryan asks, looking down at the box and pointing out a little logo toward the bottom advertising it as being for four players.

“Something like that, yeah,” Arin agrees. “I dunno, man. We really just kind of laughed it off and tossed it on the shelf as a conversation piece. I kinda forgot about it until now, actually.” He considers it unspoken but still fairly clear that they’d never actually intended to _play_ the game, but the moment the Supermega guys lay eyes on it, well…

“We _have_ to play it,” Matt insists as Ryan nods his agreement. “Dude, that’s gonna be fuckin’ _gold.”_

“Nah,” Arin replies, trying to be nonchalant about it. “I mean, it’s just gonna be a whole bunch of stuff we don’t wanna do. And even if we _did_ do it, we’d get either demonetized or full-on pulled off the site, dude. Just pick something else.”

Matt just lets out a long, disappointed whine, but Ryan, ever quick on his feet, offers, “We could set up a forfeit, then. A non-sexual, YouTube-approved forfeit. Y’know, like, the card says ‘suck his dick’, but you’re not actually gonna do that, so you gotta, like, I dunno. Put your hand in ice water, or get pied in the face.”

“We did the pies already,” Arin reminds him, “but the ice water’s not a bad idea - like a ‘do something hot or get super cold’ kinda thing? I still don’t know if it’ll be interesting to watch if we have to forfeit out of all of them because they’re too sexual, though. We might as well just call it ‘Sticking Our Hands in Ice Water’ and drop the game aspect completely.”

“They don’t have to be sexual,” Matt remarks, reading off the back of the box. “It says there are three decks - Romantic, Sexy, and Kinky. We could just stick to Romantic.”

“How romantic is ‘Romantic’, though?” Arin asks. “Because that could still be…”

“The sample card is ‘hold the hand of the person to the left of you until your next turn’,” Matt tells him. “So like, clearly some very deeply NC-17, NSFW stuff.”

“You sure that card’s not in the kinky pile?” Ryan asks, looking exaggeratedly shocked and clapping a hand to his chest in mock-horror. “My delicate sensibilities are being _rocked_ over here.”

Arin sighs. He really doesn’t want to film something that ends up being unusable, but Matt and Ryan both just look so _excited_ about it. As their boss, he doesn’t want to shoot down their idea, and as their friend, he doesn’t want to let them down. Still, as a friend and boss to both of them, to _all_ of them, he’s a little uneasy about what this game might ask them to do. Hell, might _get_ them to do, because he’s well aware that Matt and Ryan like to push the envelope well beyond what he and Dan are willing to do on their shows, and also that Dan can get extremely competitive. All that combined means Arin could see this game getting very out of hand incredibly easily, but he also _really_ doesn’t want to say any of that out loud.

“Let’s see what Dan thinks,” Arin finally says, opting to throw the ball out of his court entirely. He has a feeling Dan will veto the idea immediately, because Dan likes to play up an oversexed persona but when it comes to people he’s not actually having sex with touching him sexually, he tends to abruptly turn shy and get cold feet.

Which is why it surprises Arin so much when Dan comes back into the room, sees the box Matt’s holding, and immediately cries out, “Oh fuck yes, are we finally doing this? I’m _so_ down.”

“I’m _so_ glad,” Matt tells Dan, but he’s grinning right in Arin’s face, the little shit.

After a few minutes, they get the ice water forfeit set up and sit down to start playing, Matt on the far left, Dan on the far right, with Arin and Ryan in between them. Eventually, it turns out the constant forfeiting that Arin foresaw doesn’t actually end up being the problem. At first, that’s just because the cards are all so benign. 

“Play with the hair of the player to your left until your next turn,” Matt reads aloud, the game’s rules having decreed him to go first by virtue of being the youngest. He reaches over immediately and sharply tugs the tie out of Ryan’s hair. 

“Fuck!” Ryan yelps, clapping a hand to the back of his head. “You’re such an asshole, man, that actually really fuckin’ hurt!”

“Shh,” Matt soothes him, batting his hand away. “Let me make it better.” He gently massages the spot on Ryan’s scalp that got pulled with the tie. Matt grins to himself as Ryan immediately melts, folding his arms on the table and resting his chin on them with a contented sigh. 

“Adorable,” Dan grins as he pulls a card. “Oh, ‘Boop the nose of the player to your right’!” He giggles. “This game is so cute. C’mere, Arin.” Arin turns to him, scrunching up his face comically as Dan taps him lightly on the tip of his nose. “Boop! Okay, your turn.”

“Alright.” Arin pulls a card. “Give a random player a romantic compliment.” He glances around the circle. “Well, I bet Dan’s a very confident lover.”

“I am,” Dan confirms boldly. “Confidence is key. Your turn, Ryan.”

“Can’t focus,” Ryan admits. “It feels too nice. Can you stop for a sec?”

“It said ‘til my next turn, dude,” Matt reminds him, scritching lightly at the back of his neck and grinning as Ryan’s eyes slip closed. “You’re gonna have to deal.”

“Here,” Arin offers, pulling a card for him and reading it out loud. “Whisper something in the ear of the player to your left.’ Oh, that's me.” He leans down close to Ryan’s face. “Here, I’ll get closer for you.”

“Chimichangas,” Ryan whispers so only Arin can hear.

Arin leans back, mouth open in mock-shock. “I can’t believe you just said that.”

“What’d he say?” Dan asks.

“I’m not fuckin’ repeating that filth,” Arin says. “It’s too dirty. You’re a dirty boy, Ryan.”

“A _filthy_ boy,” Matt insists, grabbing Ryan by the hair and lightly shaking him before withdrawing his hand and grabbing another card. “‘Take a card from a different pile.’ Well, guess I’m forfeiting. Where’s the ice water?”

“You don’t wanna at least see what it is?” Ryan asks.

“Am I allowed to?” Matt directs this question toward Arin. “Arin said to only pull from the Romantic pile.”

“I didn’t say that,” Arin reminds him. “We just decided not to mix the other decks in so we wouldn’t be forfeiting constantly. You might as well at least see what it wants you to do.”

“Alright,” Matt agrees, pulling a card from the previously untouched pile. “I’ll go with Sexy, I want the best chance of _not_ putting my hand in ice water, and I have a feeling Kinky’s gonna be too much.” 

“Romantic isn’t really all that romantic,” Ryan points out. “Maybe Kinky won’t really be all that kinky.”

“Eh,” Matt shrugs. “Maybe later. For now let’s just go with…” He flips the card over, reading it out loud. “‘Sit on the lap of the player to your right until your next turn.’” He leans forward and glances over at Dan. “Be my cuddle buddy, Danny?”

“You know it,” Dan affirms, scooting his chair back from the table a bit and then patting his jean-clad thighs. “Hop on up.” 

Matt pushes his chair back and races around the table wildly fast, running behind the cameras so they’ll pick up his exaggerated heavy breathing and deliberately, comically heavy footfalls, as if there’s a time limit on the offer that he is _desperate_ not to let expire. He races back into the line of sight of the camera, collapsing sideways onto Dan’s lap. Dan, amused, stops Matt’s backward momentum with one hand before he falls into Arin and uses the other to try and block Matt’s flailing limbs from hitting Dan in the face.

“Whoa, hey, I gotcha,” Dan promises between bouts of giggles, grabbing Matt’s arm moments before he elbows Dan in the jaw and gently moving it back to his side. “Take it easy, man. I won’t let you fall.” He wraps both of his arms tight around Matt’s waist, eventually getting him settled in comfortably. Matt’s height allows him to throw an arm around Dan’s shoulders, his palm spread open like a starfish on Dan’s chest, fingers curling into the fabric of his TWRP t-shirt for some sense of stability.

“There,” Arin smiles. “Look at you two. All snuggle-bugged.”

Dan sighs, but he's grinning. “I can’t reach, can someone grab me a card?”

“Off which pile?” Ryan asks, reaching but stopping short. 

“Oh, uh,” Dan pauses, briefly  thinking it over. “Well, I mean. Sexy wasn’t as bad as we expected, and we still haven’t had someone have to do a forfeit yet. I guess I’ll go with Sexy.”

“Hey, you think if Dan has to put his hand in the ice water, he’ll jump up and Matt will go flying?” Ryan asks as if neither of the two can hear him, grabbing a card as he does.

“I hope so,” Arin replies. “That would be hilarious.”

“It says ‘Lick the balls of every player here,’” Ryan claims.

“What?!” Dan cries. “It does not. Fuckin’ give me that.”

“Why?” Ryan asks, mock innocent. “You asked me to get the card for you.”

“Because it absolutely did not go from lap-sitting to ball-licking!” Dan’s giggling, but Arin knows him enough to know when he’s getting annoyed, and he’s definitely starting to get there. Ryan sees it too, and can’t help but smirk a little at having gotten Dan riled, giving himself away. “You fuckin’ asshole, Ryan, give it here!”

Arin swipes the card from Ryan while he’s distracted and reads what it actually says before he even has time to process what he’s reading. “‘Demonstrate your best kissing skills on the player to your left.’ Oh, damn.” The words he’s reading finally catch up with him. “So uh, is that a forfeit then?”

“Fuck no that’s not a forfeit!” Dan fires back. Arin’s eyebrows shoot up. “Are you serious? I’m not forfeiting over that. That just makes it sound like I can’t fuckin’ kiss.”

“Are you serious, dude?” Arin laughs. “Is your masculinity _really_ on the line here?”

“A little bit, yeah!” Dan cries.

“I kinda see what he means,” Ryan pipes in. Arin turns to stare at him in disbelief. “No, I mean, it’s a little gay to kiss your bro, I guess, but it’s _way_ more gay not to.”

“I’m gonna need a solid thesis on that one,” Arin replies. “Like, a full fuckin’ dissertation, because I don’t…”

“Well cuz then it like, _means_ something, man,” Ryan explains. “You kiss? Fine, it’s funny, it’s no big deal. You don’t kiss? Then it’s like...why, you know? It’s just a joke, why are you making such a big deal?”

“I dunno about all that,” Dan admits. “But I do know I’m not fuckin’ forfeiting because I don’t know how to kiss.”

“No, you’re just gonna kiss Matt,” Arin finishes for him. “To prove that you do.”

“Yeah!” Dan beams. “Now you’re getting it.”

“Fuck it, man, I’m game,” Matt shrugs. Matt has few limits, and this is clearly not one of them. “You want me to spin around, straddle you?”

“I want you to get off my lap so I’m not kissing a fucking giant,” Dan replies. “I can barely fucking reach you up there.”

“Thought tall girls were your thing,” Ryan points out.

“Oh, they are,” Dan agrees quickly. “They very much are. But I’m not used to them actually being even taller than _me.”_

“Gonna have to deal,” Matt tells him. “Can’t get off you until my next turn, it said. Why am I the only one who cares about the rules of this game?”

“You’re not,” Arin retorts. “You’re just the only one using them to torment the other players.” 

Matt gives him a Cheshire grin, the sly bastard, and then swings himself around, bizarrely gracefully, to face Dan. He leans back and calls over his shoulder, “Tucker, you wanna get in close on this?”

“No,” Tucker replies dryly. “But fine, hang on.” He takes the camera off the tripod and then walks over, crouching down on his knees beside them to get the best angle of both their faces. “Alright, go.”

Matt immediately buries his hands in Dan’s hair, tipping his head back roughly, almost painfully. Dan makes a noise of not entirely pleased surprise, and Matt takes that as an opportunity to immediately shove his tongue into Dan’s mouth. He kisses him exaggeratedly sloppily, over-the-top passionate, his hands messing up Dan’s hair too aggressively to be pleasant and writhing around on Dan’s lap deliberately awkwardly and unsexily. Every time he opens his mouth against Dan’s he moans, mock-pornographically, too loudly and too high-pitched, and Arin can hear Dan’s laughter even as much as it’s muffled by Matt’s lips and tongue. 

Ryan is in hysterics next to him. Arin does his best to laugh along, even though his chest feels strangely tight. He laughs because it should be funny. It’s a pretty funny bit. He’s sure if the card had said ‘right’ instead of ‘left’, and it was Matt and Ryan sloppily, stupidly kissing each other for the sake of a bit, laughing into each other’s mouths, he’d think it was hilarious. Hell, on top of that, he’d think it was real fucking endearing that they were close enough to go for it. Fuck, if it was anyone. If it was Matt and Tucker, or Dan and...

Well. Alright then. So maybe not anyone.

Because, alright, so Arin’s mind is going a little overboard. His thoughts are overlapping and none of them are making too much sense, at least not any sense he wants to listen to. Because Arin keeps wondering if he was the only guy that Dan had kissed before now. And it’s not like he’s sure who he’d want to be the second, it's not like he wanted to offer Dan a list of recommendations, because the only recommendation he wanted to give was...well. Could it be him? Like, aside from whether Dan would want him to kiss him again or not, was that, like, allowed? Could you be someone’s both first and second, or did it just keep counting and counting every time it happened as your first time and you’re just trying over and over until you kiss someone else? Was Arin really expecting them to keep trying over and over? Had they kind of been already? 

Eventually, finally, Dan shoves Matt away from him, laughing hysterically and gasping for breath. Matt deliberately falls back off the chair, sprawling out wide on the floor. His breathing is excessively labored, he runs a hand through his own hair and then sprawls back out as if nothing happened, like that’s how his hair looked when he went down.

Dan wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and stares down at Matt in amused disbelief. “Jesus fuckin’ shit, dude,” he cries, “that was…”

“You don’t have to thank me,” Matt insists. “Just doing what the card said, baby.”

“Well, no.” Picking up the card, Dan glances up at Tucker to make sure he’s finished returning the camera to its stand after filming Matt on the ground and is ready to film again. “First of all,” he says, trying desperately to keep from laughing, “the card said for me to demonstrate on you, not for you to fuckin’...” He bites his lip, trying to keep it together. “Fuck my mouth with your tongue.” He loses it completely, burying his face against Arin’s shoulder. 

“And that’s a forfeit, by the way,” Ryan remarks.

Dan sits up sharply. “Like fuck it is!” he exclaims. “I tried to kiss him! It’s not my fault he…”

“Not you,” Ryan interrupts. He nods down at Matt. “Him. He got off your lap.”

“Oh shit!” Dan cries, whirling around to look at Matt and throwing up his hands victoriously. “Better ice that fuckin’ burn, _biiiiiiiitch.”_  

Allie comes over with a bucket of ice water. “Ugh,” Matt groans. “Ryan, why’d you have to say ice water?”

“Oh, yeah, by the way, the ice water was Ryan’s idea,” Dan informs the viewers. “Which means any pain we endure in this episode is entirely Ryan’s fault, and all the blame is on him.”

Ryan gives a dead-eyed look to the camera. “Are you proud of me now, fath...” He jerks and twists around in shock mid-word, instinctively clapping his hands to his ears as Matt plunges his hand into the bucket and lets out a scream loud enough to distort the audio. “Dude!”

“I’m sorry!” Matt screeches, every bit as loud. “It’s fuckin’ cold!”

“Oh no, you’re hurting Tucker!” Dan’s face is sympathetic but he can’t help but giggle at the sight of a thoroughly pissed-off Tucker clutching his headphones in his hands moments after yanking them off in agony.

“Dude,” Tucker snaps.

“I’m sorry, Tucker,” Matt says, shaking off his hand and gratefully accepting a nice warm towel from Allie. “Like, legit, dude, I’m sorry.” Tucker maintains a stern expression and Matt’s voice goes soft and genuine. “I really didn’t mean to, Tucker, for real. I’m sorry.”

Tucker warily puts his headphones back on and settles back in behind the camera. The other three are snickering like little kids who just watched their friend get yelled at by the teacher.

“What? Something funny to you guys?” Matt demands. “You guys are terrible friends. Tucker was in real pain.” 

“I’m so sorry, Tucker,” Dan giggles. “I was just picturing, like, if he made that noise in my mouth, how my brains would probably just like…” He gestures with his hands, laughing so hard he’s shaking, “Just like, shoot out my ears.”

“You wanna find out?” Matt offers, making kissy noises at him.

“No!” Arin says adamantly, but then he laughs it off. “We have to get back to the game, guys. I haven’t even gotten a turn.” 

“Yeah you have,” Dan reminds him. “You told me I was a confident lover, remember?"

“Oh, that’s right,” Arin agrees. “But anyway, I think we should take a break on this pile…” He pushes the ‘Sexy’ pile further back on the table and then pulls from the ‘Romantic’ pile. He flips it over and reads it. “Oh my god.”

“What?” Dan leans over his shoulder, trying to see. Arin hands him the card and he immediately collapses against Arin’s arm in laughter. “Oh no, Arin! Are you gonna forfeit?”

“What does it say?” Ryan asks.

“‘Repeat the last card played.’ And how the fuck can I forfeit?” Arin demands. “After all the shit you said about masculinity and shit? Nah, pucker up, buttercup. You brought this on yourself. You’re getting fuckin’ kissed again.”

“That is very threatening,” Dan giggles, but he angles himself to face Arin. He tilts his head and runs a hand through his hair. There’s a look in his eyes that Arin can’t quite place. 

“Well?” Dan finally asks him. “You remember what the card said?”

“Oh, I better,” Arin teases. “My masculinity’s on the line, right?”

“Yeah, it is, ” Dan replies, and the corners of his mouth twitch up in the same semi-smile as back at the bar. “So you better kiss me like you mean it.”

“I always do,” Arin admits, and before Dan has a chance to react to that, Arin gently cups his jaw, leans in, and kisses him. 

Right away, the kiss is clearly the precise opposite of Dan and Matt’s. Despite the premise that got them here, there’s no joke, there’s no bit, not anymore. Dan is kissing Arin expertly, passionately, and Arin is doing his genuine best to respond in kind. Dan is kissing him back more aggressively than he did at the bar, his movements hungrier, less self-conscious. Arin gasps slightly and Dan copies Matt’s first move, using the parting of Arin’s lips to slip his tongue between them. 

 _I love you,_ Arin thinks, the thought flooding through him, making him burn with heat. He breaks the kiss, just for a moment, just for a chance to come right back and kiss him harder. _I love you._ He does it again. _I love you._ On the third time, Dan's gasping for air when they break apart. The idea that he’s kissed Dan breathless makes Arin’s heart skip a couple beats. When he comes back again he’s kissing him about as forcefully as he can without it turning painful for one or both of them. Dan’s long fingers land on Arin’s collarbone and curl into the neck of Arin’s t-shirt, scratching lightly at his skin as they seek out his heartbeat.

Arin’s chest is aching beneath Dan's fingertips, but this time it feels like the ache breaks open and scatters into glittering white shards. He’s seeing patterns of shattered light behind his eyes, he feels dizzy. He doesn’t want to stop, not ever, but he’s long forgotten where he even is and he’s starting to get worried that if he doesn’t figure it out soon he might completely disappear off this plane of reality.

“Your turn, Ryan,” Dan says as soon as they break apart, voice cracking slightly towards the end of Ryan’s name. 

Ryan looks over at Dan with a stoic, serious expression on his face. He slowly extends his arm and then quickly, violently swipes it across the table, taking the game with him. 

“No,” Ryan replies flatly, not breaking eye contact, not even blinking. “No one’s turn anymore. _Ever.”_

Dan laughs wildly. “Wait, so are we seriously just gonna end the episo---”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (10mph end theme music)


	8. i could stare at your back all day

There are so many people in the airport, it’s making Arin feel hot and itchy. It’s bad enough being on an airplane, but then as soon as you get back on the ground, the first place you end up is an overcrowded stress zone? It’s torture.

So from the moment they landed to now, Arin’s been kind of quiet. Arin remembers when that would’ve worried Danny, but Dan knows him so well now, he knows when something’s actually wrong and when Arin’s just feeling overwhelmed. 

Dan abruptly turns to Brian, asking, “Hey, can you grab the bags? I think me and Arin are gonna step out for some air.”

Brian raises an eyebrow at first, but seeing Dan’s genuine, heartfelt expression as well as Arin’s quiet, far-off gaze, he nods without further question. Dan grabs Arin’s elbow loosely, gently, and guides him towards the exit. 

They both sit down on a bench just outside the doors, side by side, watching the line of taxis pull up to collect other travelers and then drive off to take them to their destination.

 “I read this cool article the other day,” Dan remarks casually. “About all this fucked-up stuff that’s happening on Mount Everest? Like, about why you shouldn’t climb it, basically - that was the takeaway - but there was so much that I didn’t know and it’s like, super fucked up man. People legit gotta stop climbing Everest.” 

Dan could probably keep talking like this until Brian came back out. Dan’s pretty good at that, at filling the silence when Arin’s not feeling especially talkative. But now that they’re out in the slightly cool breeze, and it’s just him and Dan, Arin’s starting to feel a bit better.

“Heard about the bodies,” Arin remarks. 

Dan glances over, looking pleasantly surprised that Arin’s joined in on the conversation so fast. “Yeah, man!” he grins. “That’s a big part of it, too. There are all those bodies, and you have to like, climb over them at certain points, cuz they’re, like, right at important climbing points? Sometimes people have to camp with them, too, if they’re in a cave they’re staying in - and when you’re climbing like that, you can’t always be like “let’s wait until we get to a part without a corpse” - you just gotta take the cave you’re given. It’s all really disturbing, dude. I spent like _hours_ reading about it, dude, it fucked me _up!”_

“Tell me more,” Arin encourages. His head feels heavy, but the bench doesn’t have a back, so he just lets his head fall onto Dan’s shoulder.  

Dan wraps an arm loosely around him. “Sure,” he says cheerfully. “There was also this part about people shoving each other on, like, super narrow ledges, trying to like, shove them out of their way so they can get a better selfie? That was more disturbing than the bodies, man, cuz that, like, lack of empathy stuff really gets to me. And there was this lady…”

Brian comes out with their bags a few minutes later, dropping Arin’s duffel bag beside him and scaring him half to death. “Sorry,” he says, genuinely looking it. “You doin’ okay, Arin?”

“Yeah,” Arin assures Brian, then glances over at Dan with a soft smile. “I’m alright. Just tired, I guess.” Dan smiles back at him.

“Mmm,” Brian hums in agreement. “I am too. I’m sure we all are.” Dan nods his assent. “Let’s get back to the hotel, get us all some rest.” He quickly flags down one of the passing taxis and climbs into the passenger seat, leaving Dan and Arin to share the back. 

While Brian chats amicably with the driver, Arin lets his head fall back onto Dan’s shoulder. His hand lands on Dan’s without him totally intending it to, but Dan immediately flips his hand over to grab onto Arin’s, lacing their fingers. Dan’s staring out the window, but he’s definitely smiling. 

When they get to their hotel, Brian takes care of checking them in while Dan and Arin sit on a round bench surrounding a fountain in the lobby. Dan dips a hand into the pool at the bottom of the fountain and plays with the water, letting it pool in his palm before dumping it out, squeezing it in his fist, running his fingers along the water’s surface. Dan’s always been drawn to water, fascinated by it. Suzy says it’s because he’s a Pisces. 

“Are you feeling better?” Dan asks. He’s not meeting Arin’s eyes, still staring down at the water, and he sounds hesitant, like he’s worried the question will upset his friend further. “I didn’t want to pry, but at the airport you seemed...distant, y’know. Like how you get sometimes. Not to say that you…”

“No, no,” Arin shakes his head. “I know what you mean. Yeah, I’m feeling better. Still tired, but better. Airports are just…”

“Airports are rough,” Dan agrees. “I figured it was that. I just get worried, I dunno.”

He tears his glance away from the water to look at Arin, and the lights at the bottom of the fountain are gleaming off his face. He looks suddenly, unexpectedly, so beautiful. The reflection of the water is dancing across his face. It’s borderline ethereal. Arin’s breath catches in his throat.

A small, soft smile crosses Dan’s lips. “I just love you a lot, Big Cat.”

Brian walks back over and hands them each a keycard. “We’re all checked in,” he tells them. “Check-out is at 11am, which is useless information to us, because we have to be at the performing arts center by seven, which means we have to leave here around six. So set your alarms for five.”

“Do you get a boner when you deliver bad news?” Dan demands, standing up. “Jesus. You said that like we won a fucking prize.” 

“You did win a prize,” Brian retorts. “The opportunity to perform for hundreds of fans.” 

“Don’t high-road me, man,” Dan says, but he’s grinning. He offers a hand to help Arin to his feet, which he doesn’t really need, but he takes anyway. 

Dan and Brian are still play-bickering as they get onto the elevator, stopping only when an elderly woman and her presumed grandson get on the elevator on the third floor. Well, Dan tries to say something to Brian in gestures and facial expressions, but Brian either doesn’t understand or pretends not to understand what he’s trying to indicate, forcing them to wait until the two of them get off on the eighth floor to say anything to him, and by that point he’s forgotten what he was so upset about it.

They reach their floor and head on down the hallway towards their room. Arin is so tired, every step makes his feet feel heavier. Noticing that Arin’s starting to lag behind him and Brian, Dan loops his arm through Arin’s elbow, gently pulling him along. It weirdly helps a lot, and Arin thankfully gets to the room without collapsing in the hallway. 

As soon as Brian gets the door open, though, Arin makes a beeline for one of the beds and collapses face-first onto it, sighing into the duvet for a moment before rolling over onto his back. His knees and ankles and feet are all screaming in agony, his back is sore from the airplane seat, his face even hurts for some reason. All he wants to do is just drink up the five hours of sleep he’s going to be barely even able to get, so he can try and at least be semi-functional the next day. He knows Dan and Brian will cover for him if he’s still feeling shitty, but he doesn’t really want them to have to.

Dan heads into the bathroom as Brian claims the other bed, his back to Arin as he unzips an expensive-looking leather suitcase. He’s the only one of the three of them who even brought actual luggage - Dan brought a backpack and Arin’s got a duffel. Their outfits for the show tomorrow are being brought by their wardrobe people, so they don’t have to worry about that, so Arin just brought three days worth of clothes, toiletries, and enough random shit to keep him occupied on the flights there and back. Judging from what Arin can see of Brian’s luggage, Brian packed absolutely everything he’d need to keep him impeccably groomed and clothed for at least a week.  

“He’s gonna want to bunk with you,” Brian remarks, carefully laying out various items. “He thinks I snore.”

“You do snore,” Arin replies. He’s seen the video. Dan showed it to him as soon as they got back.

Brian shrugs, not bothering to argue. “My point is, we have an early morning tomorrow. So maybe just focus on sleeping.”

“I know, 5am.” Arin replies. “Wait, what else would we…?”

“I just...” Brian pauses, then resumes unpacking. “I know you guys have been…” He sighs, seemingly lost for words. “Just...just sleep, alright? And try not to…” 

Dan walks out of the bathroom and drops his backpack on Arin’s bed. “So I’m _not_ sharing with Snore-y Feldman over there,” he remarks, then pauses to laugh at his own barely-a-joke joke. “You mind if I share with you?”

“No problem,” Arin replies. He glances over at Brian, then adds, “I’m probably going to be asleep in like three seconds anyway.” 

Brian nods his approval. Dan glances over at Brian briefly too, looking confused and maybe a tad bit annoyed, before replying, “Alright, cool. I’ll probably go to sleep soon, too.” 

“You better,” Brian remarks. 

“I will!” Dan insists. To punctuate this statement, he grabs hold of the hem of his shirt and then tugs it off over his head. His jeans quickly follow. Arin follows his lead, sitting up just enough to get his own t-shirt off and then wriggling out of his sweatpants. He’s long been aware that both he and Dan sleep in just their boxers, it’s just never been as relevant as it is right now, when they’re both stripping down to share a bed together. The boxers Dan’s wearing are black, short, and tight, leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. 

Brian finishes unpacking and sets his suitcase down on the floor. He’s got a set of neatly folded pajamas held in his hands. “I’m gonna go take a shower before bed,” he remarks. “You two behave yourselves while I’m gone.” 

“Arin, quick,” Dan says, loudly, trying to make sure Brian can hear him. “Let’s light everything in the room on fire.”

“Hell yeah,” Arin replies. “I think Brian’s stuff looks most flammable, don’t you?” 

Dan giggles, crawling beneath the covers. “I’m glad you’re here,” he tells him. “I mean, NSP tours are fun and all, but they always make me kinda miss the Starbomb tours.” He looks over at Arin. “They make me miss touring with you,” he says, in case Arin didn’t get the message the first time.

“I miss you so much when you’re on NSP tours, too,” Arin replies. He slides under the covers too, and their bare legs brush briefly before Arin scoots over to give Dan some more room. “I always wish I could go with you.”

“You should!” Dan cries. “Dude, you totally should if you want to! I mean, you _are_ the boss of it all. You should get to come on any tour you want!”

Arin shakes his head. “I’m not the boss of NSP, I’m just your boss for Game Grumps, I don’t…”

“Arin,” Dan giggles. “You’re in charge of our touring company!” He bumps him lightly on the shoulder. “You’re in charge of the tour we’re on now! Dude, you’re like the boss of everything!” 

“I’m not,” Arin insists. “I’m just some idiot who…”

“You are _not_ an idiot,” Dan says emphatically. He seems surprised by his own sudden ferocity and quickly glances down at his own hands, picking at the side of his thumbnail, looking uncharacteristically shy. “You’re amazing,” he murmurs, so quietly Arin’s not sure he’s actually heard him correctly.

He looks up at Arin, eyes shining with honesty and and so much sweetness. “You’re really amazing,” Dan repeats, and Arin needs sleep real bad, and he needs it now, before he does something he regrets.

Arin quickly replies, “Right now I’m amazingly sleepy. You won’t hate me for conking out on you, will you?” He punctuates the statement with a yawn. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think I can hold out for much longer.” 

“Not at all. Don’t be sorry.” Dan leans over and kisses Arin on the temple. “Sleep tight, baby bear.”

//

Two hours later, a freight train crashes through the wall. 

It doesn’t really, of course, but that’s Arin’s first thought when he’s pulled from sleep by the absolutely ungodly loud snoring coming from the next bed over. He’d thought it seemed bad on the video Dan had shown him, but it was nothing, nothing compared to actually being in the room where it’s happening. Arin’s sure the walls must be shaking. He’s starting to genuinely think they might get a noise complaint.

He’s going to have to talk to Brian in the morning, make sure a doctor knows about what is definitely, absolutely a form of sleep apnea. Arin blinks his eyes a few times, adjusting to the darkness. Brian is asleep on his back, his mouth open slightly, a torrent of loud snoring escaping every time he breathed. The only light in the room comes from the lights from the street beneath their window peeking in between the gaps in the gaudy hotel curtains. 

Arin rolls over to see if the snoring’s woken Dan up, too. He’s on his side facing away from Arin, the thick duvet tucked around his hips. The bumps of his spine are visible even in the darkness, the pallor of his skin reminding Arin of the lights from the fountain, the way they’d lit up his face in the lobby earlier. Arin swallows. 

There are two dimples, one on each side of his spine, just above the waistband of his boxers. Arin’s never noticed them before. He supposes that makes sense, considering he’s never been this close to his back for this long with no one to judge him for looking. He reaches out on pure, dumb impulse, brushing over one of the dimples with the pad of his thumb. Dan sighs in his sleep, and Arin retracts his hand, heart racing.

Dan slowly starts to stir, and Arin quickly feigns sleep. He feels the mattress shift as Dan rolls over onto his back. Arin fights to maintain a neutral expression, but he’s confused. Dan’s told him repeatedly that he doesn’t sleep on his back, that he can’t, that he always gets weird nightmares when he sleeps on his back. So what is he…?

After a moment of silence, Dan sighs again. “Oh my god,” he whispers. Arin’s heart is hammering. Had Dan been awake when he touched him? Dan murmurs, slightly louder and more urgently, “Fuck, not right now.” 

The snoring, Arin realizes. Dan must be talking about the snoring. It _is_ inconvenient, Arin agrees, but it’s a little out of character for Dan to get so annoyed about something Brian can’t help. Arin at first simply supposes the late (or early, to be more accurate) hour has pulled a little long-hidden grumpiness out of Mr. Not-So-Grump, but then, well…

“Fuck,” Dan breathes, and that’s...yeah, that’s not annoyance. Arin’s heart hammers again, but now for a whole different reason. Arin lets one eyelid open a little, peeking through his lashes. Dan squirms up a little, the blanket sliding down to his thighs. Arin swallows hard when Dan’s groin becomes visible, and the situation Arin’s in becomes clear.

Dan is lying in bed right next to him, in nothing but his boxers, and he is _rock fucking hard._

And like. Shit. Is that because of him? That can’t because of him. Right? He touched his _back_ , for God’s sake. That couldn’t have given him a boner. He can’t actually be that sensitive, that easy to turn on…

Okay. Wrong path of thought. Abort. _Abort._

Dan’s thighs fall open slightly as he lets out another soft sigh. His head is tipped against the headboard, his lips slightly parted. Swallowing hard, Dan reaches down to squeeze himself through his boxers, and the sound that escapes his lips...Arin isn’t sure he’s quite maintaining a poker face. He closes his eyes fully, both to feign sleep and to regain his composure, not able to view the sight before him for much longer without completely losing it.

“Fuck,” Dan mutters, and the bed is shifting again, this time as Dan leaves it. Arin risks another peek when he hears the bathroom door open.

And for a second, just a second, there’s Dan, illuminated by the light coming from the bathroom. His lean body is almost bare, the black of his boxers a stark contrast to his pale skin. His hard bulge is tenting his boxers, tugging the fabric out of shape. The leg hole has been pulled too far forward, and Arin sees a glimpse, just the briefest glimpse…

The bathroom door shuts and Arin rolls over onto his stomach, flattening the erection he’s now got between the mattress and his body. The pressure’s a little much, a little too nice, but it’s not quite enough to actually make him blow, and more importantly it’s hiding any sign that he knew what Dan was doing from Dan when Dan comes back. He focuses on his breathing, in his nose and out his mouth, and adamantly refuses to think about what Dan is doing just one wall away. 

Arin doesn’t time it, but it feels like forever before Dan comes back. When he finally does, he smells vaguely of hotel soap and clean sweat. He’s still a little out of breath. Arin’s heart is hammering again as Dan slips beneath the covers and settles back in.

“Sleep tight, Arin,” Dan murmurs, but it’s three hours before he has to wake up, and Arin is wide the fuck awake.


	9. and i know i've kissed you before

Dan’s moving his hips in time with the words Arin’s singing and Arin feels absolutely drunk, like he’s spinning out on Dan’s tie-dye comforter all over again.

He looks over at him, dark eyes sparkling with stage lights and performance adrenaline. Dan’s got a smile so wide, it threatens to split his face in two. Impulsively, abruptly, he throws his arms up in the air and seductively rolls his whole body, sliding a hand down his chest and throwing his head back, his expression lewd, full of mock-ecstasy. The crowd goes fucking crazy. 

Arin’s so busy staring he misses several beats, comes in late, and stumbles on his next line. Dan catches the mistake and winks at him, twirling to the beat. He ends up getting himself tangled up in the microphone cord, so Arin gently takes him by the hand and spins him the opposite way to get him untangled. Still dizzy, Dan trips over the microphone stand, catches himself against Arin’s chest.

“How was that?” Arin asks, his face incredibly close to Dan’s. It’s just the lyrics to the song, but the timing couldn’t be more perfect. Their eye contact is absolutely smoldering, and Arin’s heart is hammering much harder than stage anxiety could ever be blamed for. “Those raps do anything for ya?”

Dan bites his lip, looks up at Arin. Again, there’s a much longer pause than the song’s melody typically calls for. Dan goes up on his toes, fully bracing himself against Arin’s chest. Arin swallows so hard, he thinks the microphone picked it up. The crowd is losing it. 

Just a hair’s breadth shy of Arin’s lips, Dan abruptly twists around, leans into Arin’s microphone, and moans out a sharp little, “Oh, _god!”_  It’s way too close to how he sounded when Arin woke him up last night. Arin goes weak in the knees. 

Dan full-on steals the microphone, steps away a few paces to save Arin’s ears, and screams his next line: _“Everyone’s dead!”_

The crowd’s reaction is a mix of cheers, laughter, and boos. Dan absolutely basks in every bit of it.

/

Dan’s still breathing heavily when they get back to their dressing room, just the two of them, having lost Brian somewhere along the way. Dan’s giggling at nothing in particular, and he spins around the dressing room with his arms out to the side just like a little kid. He rushes back over and grabs Arin’s hands, jumping up and down.

“Oh, that was _awesome!”_ he squeals. He lets Arin go and runs over to a makeup chair, collapsing into it dramatically. His hands lazily bury themselves in his curls, dislodging his headband. “I could’ve stayed on that stage forever! _Ahhhh!”_

“Hey, nuh-uh, no screaming! You gotta take it easy on your voice, man,” Arin warns, already hearing the slight rasp that Dan always gets from overworking his vocal chords. Arin grabs the abysmal-tasting lemon-honey-ginger concoction that Dan’s vocal coach had recommended for him out of the mini-fridge and hands it to him then sits down in the makeup chair next to the one Dan’s occupying, spinning it around so they’re face to face. “I agree, though. It was a fantastic show.”

“It was amazing,” Dan agrees, unscrewing the cap of the thermos as he talks. “I mean, they’re all amazing, we’ve never had a _bad_ show, but that one seemed like, I dunno. Just extra great.” The rasp is more noticeable when he’s talking more softly. He must hear it, too - his fingers go to his own throat, gently pressing and massaging. 

He shrugs out of his bright blue vest and then, seemingly as an afterthought, ditches the white undershirt too. Arin tries not to stare, but it’s hard when Dan’s bare-chested and practically fucking glowing with a post-show high.

Tipping his head back and closing his eyes, Dan takes a long swig from the thermos and sighs peacefully. Seemingly reading Arin’s mind, Dan murmurs, “God, I feel high as fuck, man.”

“Endorphins and shit,” Arin informs him.

“Yeah,” Dan nods. “Endorphins and adrenaline and, uh...”

“And maybe all that cocaine we did before the show,” Arin jokes.

“Yeah,” Dan agrees, one side of his mouth twitching up in a sleepy smile. “That too.”

They sit there in amicable silence for a moment before Dan giggles slightly. “What?” Arin asks, smiling at him.

Dan shakes his head. “Nothing. I was just thinking about something.”

“What were you thinking about?” Arin’s not sure why he’s pressing so hard, there’s just something intriguing about Dan’s little half-smile. And something inviting, too, like Dan wants him to ask. “Something good?”

“Don’t worry about it!” Dan’s grinning, now, full-on and wild, a grin that eventually dissolves into helpless, random giggles.  Arin wonders if this is how Dan used to be when he was stoned all the time. Arin’s nothing but proud of Dan for quitting smoking, but sometimes he’s secretly a little bit bummed that he never got to meet stoner Dan.

This, though, this is pretty good too. Dan lets his fingers wander past his throat, down onto his chest. He runs his nails lightly over his skin, tipping his head back just like he did on stage and letting his eyes slip closed. Arin can’t help but comment, “You know you’re not performing anymore, right, Sexbang?”

“Not on stage,” Dan agrees. He opens his eyes partway, leaving them slightly half-lidded. He smirks. “Just for you, baby boo.”

Arin swallows, hard. He feels drunk again. “Dan,” Arin says, and Dan hears something serious in his voice, opens his eyes fully and focuses on Arin with a look of genuine concern. “Uh, so Brian…”

Dan waves him off. “Don’t worry about Brian,” he insists. 

“No, dude, listen,” Arin interrupts. “Last night, at the hotel, he, like…” Fuck. Arin can’t find the words to say it, not without sounding like a desperate 13-year-old. 

“Fuck, man, I’m so sorry,” Dan says, quickly grabbing Arin’s hand and squeezing it tight. “I’ll talk to him. He means well, he really does, but sometimes he can…” He trails off, shaking his head. “Was he like, asking you what was wrong and stuff...? Cuz I told him not to do that, dude, I swear I did, but I think he just gets concerned, y’know, I guess it’s the dad in him. I did tell him you just needed space and nothing was actually wrong, but I guess he…”

“No, no, it wasn’t that,” Arin tells him. “No, he was super cool about all that, he just…” 

“What?” Dan asks, and the concern in his eyes is heartbreaking. “What is it? I’ll totally talk to him for you, man, just…”

“I’m pretty sure he full-on told me not to fuck you last night,” Arin blurts, and there it is, right out out in the open.

 _“What?!”_ Dan cries, and Arin expected the surprise, and maybe a bit of outrage, but he didn’t expect Dan’s complaint to be, “Why the fuck would I be the bottom? _You’re_ the one who likes to put stuff up your ass!”

“I don’t…!” Arin starts, but there’s really no point in arguing when there’s recorded audio evidence of him openly admitting to exactly what Dan just accused him of, so he changes tactics. “You’d like it too, man, you’ve just never tried it!”

“I don’t _wanna_ try it!” Dan insists. “That sounds painful and humiliating, and I frankly don’t understand going through the trouble of fucking around with my ass when I’ve got a perfectly good dick right here that hasn’t fucking failed me yet!”

“Yeah, sure, getting your dick touched is great,” Arin agrees, “But dude, I’m telling you, if you were bent over this chair taking my cock right now, if I was pressing right up against that sweet spot deep inside you right _fucking_ now, you’d be moaning your pretty little head off. You’d be absolutely fucking _sobbing_ with joy. You’d fucking _love_ it, dude.” 

There’s a pause. A painfully long pause.

“Jesus,” Dan breathes. “Zero to boner in ten seconds, man, holy fuck.” 

And fuck it, it’s out there, Arin might as well admit, “Same, dude. Fuckin’ same.” 

There’s a couple more seconds of pause. Arin, feeling awkward, tries to change the subject, asking, “So where do you think Brian is, anyway?”

“Honestly?” Dan sets the thermos down on the makeup table, heavily, deliberately, like he’s steeling himself.  “Hopefully taking a fucking hint.” In one swift move, Dan pushes himself up out of his chair and lets the momentum send him right onto Arin’s lap. 

The sudden, immediate pressure on his groin has Arin groaning in pleasure before Dan’s even fully sat down.  “Fuckin’...holy shit, dude,” Arin cries. 

“Is this okay?” Dan asks, and fuck, his voice is so breathy and still raspy and Arin’s about to go fucking cross-eyed with how turned on he is.

“Yes,” Arin says quickly. “Adamantly, vehemently yes. Can I…?” Before Arin can even finish the question, Dan’s thrown his arms around Arin’s neck and kissed him. Arin’s hands settle on Dan’s bare hips,  pulling him even closer until he can feel Dan’s boner pressing against his lower stomach. Dan lets out a soft, surprised squeak that’s more adorable than it has any right to be.

There’s no game, there’s no dare, there’s no joke, no audience, no pretense for this happening except that Dan’s here and Arin’s here and they really kinda wanna kiss each other, like, kind of a lot.

And god, is it ever good. Arin’s goal as soon as they started kissing was to kiss Danny so good he’d moan right out loud, but instead Dan’s just stayed silent and risen up to the challenge, kissing Arin with just as much fervor and seemingly the exact same goal. 

Dan spreads his thighs further apart, sliding forward and slipping his legs through the open arms of the chair so he’s really, fully straddling Arin. Arin’s cock is neatly pressed up against Dan’s ass, and Dan’s is flush between Dan’s flat stomach and Arin’s softer one. 

Arin’s genuinely starting to wonder if it’s possible to faint from being too turned on, because his head is absolutely spinning out of control. He finally has to lean back for air, and he gets what he wanted: Dan lets out a soft moan. It’s quiet but it’s _desperate,_ and it’s an even prettier sound than Arin had ever imagined. 

The post-concert rasp gives his voice a hint of a growl as he cries out, “Arin, why the _fuck_ would you _stop?”_

Arin laughs but it comes out breathy as all shit. “Gotta come up for air, dude.”

“Fuck,” Dan groans. “Can’t you just breathe extra later?”

“Can’t argue with that logic,” Arin says. “Well, I can, and probably should, but…”

Dan shuts him up with a kiss and yeah, okay, Arin can definitely save breathing for later. Dan whispers Arin’s name against Arin’s skin, and Arin slips his tongue past Dan’s lips, wanting to taste his name in Dan’s mouth. The word tastes sweet on Dan’s tongue.

Arin rests a hand on the small of Dan’s back, holding him steady and keeping him close. He feels one of the dimples he noticed last night, right under the pad of his ring finger, and he can’t resist the urge to brush his finger over it a few times, back and forth over the small, soft indentation.

Squirming a little, Dan leans back and murmurs, “Mmm, sensitive there.” 

Remembering something, Arin leans forward and presses his lips just below Dan’s jawline, close to his ear. “Here too, right?” Arin asks against the skin.

 _“Fuck,”_ Dan cries, head tipping back, his grip going tigher in Arin’s shirt. “When the fuck did I tell you that?”

“You didn’t,” Arin says. “Well, you did, but only after I kissed you there.”

“When did you…?” Dan pauses, taking a moment to catch up. The realization is visible on his face when he figures it out. “Ohh, for that music video.” He glances down at his own chest, at his own peaked nipples, and adds, “You licked my fuckin’ nipple, too. Gave me a boner and everything.”

“I didn’t,” Arin tells him. “Lick you, I mean. I wanted...I mean, I thought about it, but I didn’t. I just kissed it.”

“Well, it was enough,” Dan replies. He giggles softly. “God, we’ve done some really gay shit together, Arin.” 

“Yeah, man,” Arin agrees. “We’ve made out, like, what, three times?”

“We have not!” Dan insists, looking way too scandalized for a dude who’s got his own hard cock pressed to his stomach and Arin’s boner nestled in the fucking cleft of his ass. “When the fuck did we _make out?”_

“Uh, at that weird bar,” Arin replies, “and on the Power Hour, fuckin’ twice.”

“Okay, no, we kissed at Kermit’s Pub,” Dan says. “Kissed, not made out. Once. And then, yeah, kissed again on the Power Hour. Once. We’ve kissed twice. We’ve made out never.”

“We’ve kissed at _least_ four times,” Arin insists, “and no less than two of those were at least _pretty_ close to making out, dude. Your hand was on my leg, there was definitely some tongue - in three of them, actually. The first one was nothing _but_ tongue!”

“Wait, are you talking about that fucking marshmallow thing?” Dan asks. “Is that why you fucking cut that from the episode, dude? Because you thought we _made out?”_    
  
“It seemed pretty big at the time,” Arin admits. “I didn’t cut it, Tucker did, but I didn’t veto it getting cut, either.”

“We have not made out,” Dan once again insists. He pauses, considers their current positions. “Well. Now we’ve kinda made out, even though you still haven’t even made it to second base.” He looks pointedly down at his chest.

Arin rolls his eyes, snorting with laughter. “Dan, if you want me to touch your nips, just ask. You don’t have to like, drop it casually in conversation. You’re not subtle, bro.” Not waiting for a response, Arin reaches out and gently brushes his thumb over one pebble-hard, pale pink bud. Dan rolls his hips hard against Arin’s, making both of them gasp and groan.

“Again, fuck,” Dan cries. “Fuckin’...harder. You can even…” The sentence ends with a hiss as Arin sharply pinches a nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “Fuck, yes, that, exactly that, _god.”_ He draws a long, shuddering breath in through his nose and then sighs it right back out. 

“You sure you don’t want me to fuck you?” Arin pants. “Because I would, man. I fuckin’ would.”

“Shit,” Dan cries. “I’ve, uh...I’ve thought about it, dude, I really fucking have.” He lets out another loud, sharp moan. All the sounds Dan’s making can’t be good for his overworked throat, but Arin doesn’t have it in him to tell him to stop. He just hopes that nasty lemon drink can heal whatever damage Dan might be doing.

“Yeah?” Arin encourages. “What have you thought about?” 

“Arin, this feels so _good,_ I don’t know if I can…” Dan bites his lip, throwing his head back with a sharp cry.

“Kiss me,” Arin blurts, then flushes. “If you...or you, uh, when you…”

“God, yes,” Dan cries. “Shit, Arin, you don’t have to be embarrassed.” 

Threading his hands into Arin’s hair, Dan, once again a hair’s breadth from Arin’s lips, gasps, “Kiss me til I come, baby,” and closes the distance between them with the kind of kiss that wins Oscars. 

Arin rolls Dan’s nipple between his fingers with one hand, strokes up and down his back with the other. Dan keeps one hand threaded in Arin’s hair and lets the other drift down to the back of Arin’s neck. All the while, he’s rolling his hips, shamelessly seeking friction against Arin’s stomach. Dan squirming around on his lap is driving Arin absolutely crazy, and eventually he can’t help himself from grinding up against Dan’s ass. Dan lets out a porno-queen moan that Arin’s almost sure someone must have heard from the hallway, but he can’t be arsed to care, and Dan doesn’t seem to care about absolutely anything but getting off at this point.

“Fuck, Arin,” Dan gasps, leaning away for just a moment before swooping right back in. His moans and cries are swallowed up by Arin’s mouth, and Arin feels him coming against his stomach even through the pants he’s wearing.

As he’s coming down, he presses his lips to Arin’s temple. “I fucking love you,” he breathes, and Arin dies a little death beneath him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the song they're singing at the concert at the beginning of this chapter is "Hero of Rhyme" by Starbomb


	10. but i didn't do it right

“It’s...a little sexy,” Suzy warns him. “Is that okay?”

“Sexy is always okay!” Dan insists, but then Danny Sexbang, the boisterous stage persona, flickers away and leaves only sweet, slightly awkward Dan Avidan in his place. “Uh, no nudity though, right?” he clarifies. He smiles awkwardly, tries to make a joke out of it, “It’s in my contract.”

“I didn’t get that contract,” Arin remarks, winking at him. He’s munching on a slice of cold pizza he nabbed from the fridge as they walk down the hall to the spare bedroom they converted into Suzy’s studio.

“Wouldn’t think you’d need it in your contract, working for YouTube,” Suzy points out. “They don’t allow nudity anyway.”

“Have you seen the stuff Matt and Ryan do on their channel?” Dan asks. “It’s _definitely_ needed.” 

“Well, either way, there’s no nudity required,” Suzy promises. “It’s just a crop top. You can even keep your jeans on, if you want.” 

“Oh shit, a crop top?” Dan’s eyebrows shoot up. “You sure you want me to model it, Suze?” He lifts up his t-shirt and pokes at the taut, slightly tan skin. “Not sure that’s gonna sell any merch for ya, to be honest.”

“Shush, you’re perfect,” Suzy insists, tickling lightly at his bare stomach until he giggles and pushes her hands away, tugging his shirt back into place. “But you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to.”

“I’ll do it if you really want me to,” Dan tells her, giggles still bubbling from his lips even though she’s stopped tickling him. “But there’s a reason I don’t usually wear them.”

“Yeah, it’s called heteronormative gender roles and a diet culture that encourages body shaming,” Arin informs him as they walk into Suzy’s studio. Suzy quirks an appreciative eyebrow. “Yeah, that’s right. I read!”

It’d be small for a bedroom, but it’s a decent-sized studio, and it has a small, devoted area for each of her many hobbies. Dan pointedly chooses to walk much more closely to the desk holding her screen-printing supplies in order to avoid walking too close to her taxidermy desk. There’s a large black bird she’s stuffed and is sitting waiting to dry, a half-finished board of pinned tarantulas, and a half-stuffed badger lying on the table. The partially flat badger body seems to be what’s skeeving Dan out the most, he won’t even look at it. Arin’s got a keen eye for these sorts of things, and thus makes a beeline for it.

“Hi, friend,” Arin says, shaking the badger’s flat paw in greeting. Dan cringes hard.

“Be gentle with him, Arin,” Suzy warns him.

“I’m being nice,” Arin insists. “I’m being friendly to him.”

“He’s been through enough,” Suzy replies. “He’s dead.”

“And flat,” Dan adds. “Well, half-flat. _God_ , that’s disturbing.”

“And now he’s getting a handshake!” Arin cries. “We’re pals! He’s my buddy!”

Suzy shakes her head with a soft smile. “Okay, Arin, alright,” she acquiesces. “Leave your buddy alone for now and come over here.”

“Why?” Arin asks, walking over to the photo studio Suzy’s set up at the back of the room. “I thought Dan was gonna be the one modeling, not me.”

“He is,” Suzy confirms, “But I still want your help. Which color, do you think?” She holds up three pieces of clothing -  one lime green, one deep crimson-y red, and one bright purple. “I think I know which one you’re gonna choose.”

“You think I’m gonna go purple?” Arin asks. Suzy nods, smiling. Arin shakes his head, “I actually think I like the red one best. I think it’ll go nicely with the reddish highlights in his hair.”

“Arin!” Suzy beams. “That's a good point, I didn’t even _think_ of that! You’re _so_ right!”  She holds up the red next to Dan’s face and squeals happily. “You go change, Dan, I’ll set up the scene.” She hands Dan the shirt and then sets to work pulling a black velvet chaise into the center of the scene. Arin rushes over to help.

Dan holds up the shirt to his chest. “God, that’s really _not_ a lot of fabric,” he remarks. “Uh, maybe don’t put too much effort into setting up the scene just yet, in case you hate how I look in this?”

“I won’t _hate_ how you look in anything,” Suzy promises, pulling a dark mahogany end table over next to the chaise. “Dan, I’ve known you for years. I know how you look with a shirt on, I know how you look _without_ a shirt on, I can pretty easily picture what you’ll look like with half a shirt on. Unless you got some crazy tattoo or piercing recently, you’re really not going to surprise me.”

“But…” Dan begins, cheeks flushing.   
  
“ _But,_ ” Suzy interrupts, setting a vase on the end table and pausing to look up at him, “If you put it on and decide _you_ don’t want to go through with it, it’s fine, Dan, I can just model it myself.”

She tucks a lock of hair behind her ear, smiling gently at him. “But I really do think you’ll look great. I never would’ve asked you to do it otherwise.”

“And the lovelies will love it,” Arin remarks. “You have a lot of the red one in stock, right, Suze? Everyone’s gonna wanna buy that one.” 

“I do,” Suzy confirms. “I made a lot of all the colors. I really like these designs!”

“Okay,” Dan agrees. “Fine.” He glances down at the shirt in his hand one more time, sighs, and walks off down the hallway to their bathroom.

“He’s gonna look cute as fuck in that top,” Suzy remarks, sliding the rose into the vase and tilting her head to the side, adjusting it. “With those hips? My _god._ I dunno why he’s so worried.”

“He thinks he’s too skinny,” Arin tells her. “What do you think of this? The heart matches the shirt.” He holds up a black teddy bear with a dark red broken heart on its chest, like a goth Care Bear.

“It won’t fit on the end table, but we can have a pic or two of him holding it,” Suzy replies. She takes the bear and sets it down beside the chaise. “Do you think he’d let me put some eyeliner on him? Just a little? It’d really tie the look together.” She wordlessly beckons for more roses.

“Probably,” Arin answers, handing her a handful of plastic flowers. “He wears makeup for NSP. And besides, I bet you he’d let you do just about anything. He’s easy like that.”

“Easy, huh?” Suzy winks at him. Arin can’t help but blush. “Oh, Dan I knew it, you look _fantastic!”_

Arin glances over his shoulder and yeah, shit, she wasn’t lying. The top is a tank style, the spaghetti-thin straps showing off the impressive muscles of his arms. It’s tight on his chest but loose around his midriff, stopping mid-ribcage with a gentle flow of fabric. Every step he takes has the thin material slightly rippling around his ribs, the way some of Suzy’s skirts flow around her thighs. His cheeks are tinged pink, and he keeps tugging at the hem of the shirt, clearly not used to the way his skin is exposed to the air. 

“I like the little devil girl on it, it’s a super cute design,” Dan remarks, trying to divert attention from himself. Arin hadn’t even thought to look at that, but it absolutely is. The shirt has a drawing of a sexy girl in a little black dress with devil horns and a pointed tail, drawn by Suzy in an old-timey cartoon style that reminds Arin of his and Dan’s aborted attempt at a playthrough of Cuphead. The devil girl is blowing a kiss with full, glossy, red-painted lips, her tail curled into the shape of a heart. 

“Thanks,” Suzy grins. “Now stop fidgeting with the hem, you look great. Arin, can you please tell him he looks great?”

“You, like, actually really do look kind of amazing, man,” Arin insists. His mouth is a little dry. Along with the red cropped tank top, Dan’s got on a pair of black jeans, tight on his thighs but loose enough at the waist that they’re sagging down a bit, exposing more than half the waistband on his boxer briefs. He’s wearing either the same pair he was wearing at the hotel or an identical pair, Arin can tell just from the waistband. The image of Dan wearing them is still seared into his brain so clearly.

“I feel like such a twink,” Dan remarks. He tugs at the hem of the shirt again, fidgeting a little in place. “A twink whose clothes shrunk in the dryer.” 

“You don’t have to model it if you don’t like wearing it,” Suzy reminds him. “I want you to be comfortable. Do you wanna model something else? I have some hoodies I was gonna get Ross and Arin to model for me next week, but we could...”

“No, no, it’s okay. It’s slowly growing on me,” Dan insists. He sits down on the chaise, then leans back. He lifts one foot up onto the arm of it, then drops it back on the floor. He squirms a little, then glances up at Suzy. “How, uh, how do you want me?” 

“Sit up a minute,” Suzy says, walking over and sitting next to him, pulling a black eyeliner pen out of her pocket. “I wanna do a quick bit of eyeliner, if that’s okay?”

“Fuck, Suze,” Dan sighs, but he can’t help but smile slightly. “You’re really out to torture me. Fine, just don’t stab me in the eye.”

“I would _never_ ,” she promises, uncapping it and crouching down, resting a hand on his cheek to keep his head stable. “Stay still, okay?”

“As a statue,” he replies. “Do I have to keep my eyes open?”

“Closed is fine,” she tells him. “Just try to stay very still for me, okay?”

There’s a tinge of unease in his voice as he says, “Mmm-hmm,” but he stays pretty still for her anyway. In two quick flashes she’s drawn matching lines over each of his eyes. She fills in the cat-eye swoop that she’s stenciled out, tilts his chin up, and finishes off with a dramatic flick at each end. 

“Done,” she beams. She reaches behind her, grabbing an ornate handheld mirror. “Here, look.”

Dan slowly blinks his eyes open. His eyebrows shoot up. “Shit, Suzy, that’s incredible. I look like you!”

Suzy grins. “I gave you a cat eye,” she informs him. “That is one I like to do a lot, but that’s about one step out of thirty when it comes to my daily makeup routine.” She reaches out, adjusting his hair so it’s parted down the side rather than the center. “I like your hair better like that.”

“I do too,” Dan confesses. “It just tends to fall to the center, usually, and I don’t bother changing it.” The change in part makes Dan’s hair look fuller on one side than the other. It’s a good look for him.

“Okay, lay back,” Suzy instructs. 

Dan leans back against the couch, arm draped over the back. “Like this?” he asks. 

“Your pose looks a little awkward,” Suzy admits. “Can you arch your back a little bit more?” Dan squirms around a little but can’t quite get himself into the right position. “Arin, can you help him?”

Arin glances up. He’d started playing on his phone to keep from blatantly staring. “Huh? Me?”

“Yeah, you’ve got a good eye for this stuff,” Dan agrees. “Come move me around, make me look good. I wanna get this right.”

Swallowing, Arin walks over. He can immediately see the problem - Dan’s trying to tuck his long legs up onto the chaise, and it doesn’t leave quite enough room for his body, leaving him awkwardly curled in the corner. Arin grabs one of Dan’s knees, unbending it and setting his foot on the ground. The other rests on the arm of the chaise, finally allowing the room for Dan’s hips to slide forward. When Dan doesn’t do it himself, Arin reaches forward and does it for him, his hands halfway on black denim and halfway on pale skin.

“Shoulders back a little,” Suzy instructs. Dan presses his shoulders back, making his chest push forward and his back arch more dramatically. “Perfect!” Arin steps out of frame, joining Suzy behind the camera, and draws in a long, slow breath. The way Suzy has Dan centered in the lens has him looking almost unbearably good, all the lines and angles of his body curved to look their very best. Suzy snaps the picture.

“Turn around, let me see the back,” Suzy tells him. Dan shifts on the couch, going up on his knees and turning. Arin’s jaw literally drops. The thin straps from the front carry around to the back in a criss-crossing corset-like pattern. The dark red is striking against Dan’s skin, and the ornate lace-up pattern looks flawlessly defined on Dan’s thin form and makes his bone structure seem all the more delicate and waifish. The only flaw is the sloppy, lopsided bow Dan clearly tied blindly behind his back.

“I really wanna show the back off,” Suzy explains. “It makes the top adjustable, so it’s super unisex. You can wear it with any size boobs, or no boobs at all!” She furrows her brow a little. “Oh no, Dan, your bow-tying skills are a little lacking.”

 _“You_ try and tie a bow behind _your_ back,” Dan grumbles over his shoulder. 

“I have,” Suzy replies. “A lot of times, actually.” She gestures to Arin. “Can you go help him, please?”

“On it.” Arin carefully climbs over the tangle of cords and wires, crouching down next to Dan and gently untying the haphazard attempt at a bow. The shirt goes slightly slack as the bow’s undone, making Dan instinctively wrap his arms around himself to keep the shirt in place. He glances over his shoulder, eyes half-lidded as he looks down at Arin, who meets his eyes, tries to smile but it comes out a little heated, a little shaky. Dan swallows audibly. 

Tugging at the ties gets a soft gasp out of Dan as the shirt goes tight around his chest. “Is that good?” Arin asks. Dan nods, but Arin sneaks a hand around his ribs anyway, running a hand over the fabric at his chest to check for wrinkles or spots that felt slack. He feels Dan’s heart hammering beneath his fingertips, feels a hard bump and a sharp gasp as he passes over a nipple inadvertently. 

He ties a neat bow at the center of Dan’s spine, runs a finger down the raised ridges, stares at the little dimples above his waistband and resists the urge to feel them, too, to find out how hard Dan would squirm with Suzy standing right there. 

“All set, Suze,” Arin tells her, walking back around to the camera. If Suzy notices the slightly larger bulge in Arin’s sweatpants, she doesn’t comment on it. 

“Sweep your hair forward, over your shoulder,” Suzy says. “As gorgeous as your curls are, I want to be able to see the whole back of the shirt. There, perfect.” She snaps the picture - Dan, with his curls pulled forward to show off the corseted back of the shirt, looking over his shoulder, his eyes slightly half-lidded. 

The camera lets out an abrupt series of beeps, startling all of them. “Fuck,” Suzy mutters. “I thought this might happen. I have a spare battery upstairs.” She turns and races off, calling out a quick “Wait here!” over her shoulder as she goes.

“Arin, come over here and sit with me,” Dan beckons, settling back down into a natural position on the couch. His stomach doesn’t even fold as he sits practically slouched - Arin can’t help but feel a little jolt of jealousy. He heads over and joins him, running a hand over the soft velvet.

“I love this thing, it’s so soft,” Arin remarks. “It used to be in our bedroom, but Suzy found a really nice dark purple one that matches the rest of the room a lot better. We both liked this one too much to get rid of it, though, so she just keeps it as a prop for photos now.” 

“It’s nice,” Dan agrees. “Comfy, too. I could nap on this.”

“Your legs won’t fit,” Arin reminds him. “We already established that.”

“They kinda will,” Dan insists, draping his legs over Arin’s to demonstrate. “If I just…”

“Is that a comfortable position to sleep in?” Arin asks, moving his arms to accommodate Dan’s legs and then settling his arms so they’re draped over Dan’s thighs. “I don’t think I’d be able to sleep like that. Though you slept through Brian’s snoring, even I couldn’t do that.”

Dan sits up suddenly, his legs still in Arin’s lap and his expression unreadable. “I’m pretty sure,” Dan says, slowly. “That I woke up to go to the bathroom, and _you_ were still asleep.” 

“Maybe we woke up at different times,” Arin offers weakly. “And the other one was asleep? Or still trying to sleep?”

“Arin,” Dan says, settling him with a look. “Was I awake when you woke up?”

“No,” Arin insists, but he wilts under Dan’s look. “Not at first.”

“Fuck,” Dan breathes. “So you saw me? You were…?”

“I had my eyes closed,” Arin insists. “I was trying to go back to sleep. I heard you wake up, I thought you were maybe pissed, at first. At Brian. For snoring.”

“He can’t help it,” Dan replies. “I wouldn’t be…” 

“I know,” Arin nods. “That’s what I thought too. Then I heard you moving, and you didn’t sound mad anymore, you sounded…” Arin swallows. Dan’s gaze beckons him on. “Fuck, you really want me to…? You sounded horny, okay, you sounded fuckin’ turned on, and then you ran off to the bathroom, presumably to jack off or something.”

“Jesus,” Dan breathes. His cheeks are bright pink. “Arin. Take it easy on the dirty talk, dude, I’m gonna have a boner for your wife’s fuckin’ photo shoot.”

“I’m not _dirty talking,_ ” Arin retorts. “You wanted to know what happened, so I told you.”

“Did you see anything?” Dan demands. 

“No,” Arin says. “No, I didn’t even open my eyes.”

“Arin,” Dan says again, but he’s grinning. “You’re a terrible fuckin’ liar.”

“I’m sorry,” Arin says, blushing. “I didn’t mean to lie, I just…”

“Sorry that took so long!” Suzy cries, bustling into the room. “I thought I left it in the kitchen, but it was in the...oh!” She stops in her tracks, giggling. “Don’t you two look comfy!”

Dan lets his gaze linger on Arin for a moment before glancing over at Suzy. “Don’t we?” Dan asks, resting a hand on Arin’s chest. “What do you think, Suze? Should we get Arin in a couple of pics?”  
  
“Sure!” Suzy replies. “What pose should you guys to be doing, do you think?” 

“I dunno,” Dan shrugs, his tone devious. “Maybe something like this.”

He uses his free hand to guide Arin’s chin towards him, then leans up slightly and closes the gap between them. It’s a quick, chaste little peck, but Arin’s face feels like it’s on fire when Dan leans away. He glances over at Suzy and Arin follows his gaze.

“Wow!” a pleasantly surprised Suzy remarks. “Well, that would definitely sell shirts!” Dan giggles, nuzzling his head onto Arin’s shoulder.

“Yeah,” Dan agrees. “I mean, I know I’m sold.”


	11. can i try again, try again, try again?

As soon as Suzy opens the gate, Arin’s immediately met with a cold, wet, slippery, and barely-clothed Ross crashing directly into his torso.

“Ah, you guys made it!” he giggles, clinging on despite Arin’s attempts to peel him off. His breath smells strongly of liquor and his hair is sticking up in weird points at odd angles that had to have been done deliberately. “I wasn’t sure you would!”

“I _told_ you they would,” Dan retorts, swimming up to the side of the pool with a splash and resting his arms on the side. “They got here _right_ when I said. I’ve been here, like, almost exactly an hour.” 

Arin finally manages to pry Ross off his chest right as Dan hauls himself out of the pool, giggling at the sight of the Ross-shaped wet spot left on Arin’s otherwise dry clothes. Dan wrings out his hair and then shakes his head like a wet dog, chlorinated water flying in all directions. 

Suzy shields her face with her hands, turning away. _“Danny!”_

“I mean, should you even be wearing all that makeup to a pool, Suzy?” Ross inquires. He dances around menacingly, playfully flinging water in her direction. “Kinda dangerous, don't ya think?”

“Oh, don’t worry, Ross, I got that Ben Nye shit,” Suzy assures him. She assumes a wide stance and dramatically beckons him like they’re in a cheesy martial arts movie. “Come at me, scrublord! I’m _sealed!”_ Ross fakes like he’s about to go for her, then lets out a girlish mock-scream and darts off in the other direction. Cackling madly, Suzy chases after him.

Dan steps to the side to let them pass, then leans lazily against the gate next to Arin. “Hey, stranger, I missed you,” he says, grinning. He’s bare-chested, and soaking wet, his trunks plastered to his thighs and getting slightly dragged down by virtue of being so waterlogged. Arin reaches over and tugs gently on the end of one wet curl, pulling it straight then letting it coil itself around his finger.

“Missed you too,” he replies. It’s been almost precisely one hour since Arin left work to go pick up his swimsuit and his wife, sending Dan off to the party ahead of him with a mock-salute in the parking lot. Dan giggles a little, leans into Arin’s palm so that he’s cupping Dan’s face. There’s a slight rasp of few-days-old stubble, and he’s close enough that Arin can smell the sunscreen on his skin. The sunlight catches the copper highlights in his eyelashes, makes his dark eyes look almost honey-colored. 

“I love you,” Arin breathes before he even realizes he’s saying it. 

Dan blinks, surprised and smiling. “Where did that come from?” Dan asks.

“I dunno,” Arin shrugs. Dan keeps staring, and staring, until finally Arin just blurts, “You’re just like. Like, sometimes I look at you and you’re just...so lovely and perfect. It just _gets_ to me sometimes.”

“Yeah?” Dan quirks a brow, but he reaches out and laces his fingers with Arin’s. “Gets to you how?” Dan steps closer, ducking his head to talk right in Arin’s ear, his wet curls brushing Arin’s cheek. “Arin? You good?”

“Yeah, man,” Arin nods, getting goosebumps up his neck from the deep timbre of Dan’s voice rumbling right in his ear. “I’m good. Really good. I just...just _really_ fuckin’ love you, okay? I don’t know.”

Dan leans back, regarding him for a long moment in the golden light of early evening. “Yeah. Okay,” he says finally, a gentle smile on his sun-warmed face. “I know.” 

/  
  
One thing Arin’s always especially liked about being with Suzy so long is that he never really had to go to parties alone. He’d never envied those who did. But he and Suzy getting such an early start also means it’s been a long, long time since he’s been in a public space with someone he hasn’t had proper sex with but really, _really_ wants to.

Dan has spent the entire party half-clothed, which is justifiable by it being a pool party but also absolutely not justifiable because Dan is unjustifiably attractive, and having such an attractive man spend the day close to you, his skin warmed from the sun and smelling of sunscreen, his eyes sparkling like he’s enjoying sharing this little secret with Arin and no one else knowing about it...it’s absolute torture, and Dan’s got this little Ross-like cheeky grin like he knows it.

“Was that a raindrop?” Brian asks suddenly, frowning and wiping at his cheek, then examining the droplet on his fingertips.

“Probably just a pool drop,” Ross replies, sitting on the edge of the pool with a daiquiri in one hand and Suzy’s black sunhat in the other. “Yknow, from the pool?”

“Felt like it came from the sky,” Brian insists. 

The door slides open behind them as a flustered Suzy comes running from inside. She spies the sunhat and her eyes immediately narrow. “Damn it Ross, I _knew_ it was you! Give me my fucking hat back!”

“No! It’s my hat!” Ross insists. Suzy rolls her eyes, grabs hold of it and tugs. Ross holds tight. “Help! Police! This scary lady is stealing my hat!”

“Watch it,” Arin warns. “You’re lucky Suze likes to be called scary, but you watch your tone, boy.”

“Sorry, Suzy,” Ross replies He offers the hat to her as a truce. “I meant scary in the best way possible.”

“You better,” Suzy replies. Ross bites his lip, looking apologetic. Suzy responds by grinning and putting the hat on Ross’s head.  
  
“Shit, I just felt one too,” Dan says, clapping a hand to his shoulder. “You weren’t lying for once, Brian!”

“Wow, gee, thanks for the amazing backup, Dan,” Brian stoically states. He glances up at Ross. “Was it supposed to rain today?”

“I dunno,” Ross tells him, adjusting the brim of the hat. “I didn’t check.”

Barry fixes him with a look. “Ross. You threw a pool party without checking if it was gonna rain?”

Ross pouts. “It’s LA,” he protests. “It only rains, like, three days a year.”

“Thirty-four days, actually, on average,” Dan pipes in. Numerous people turn to him. He shrugs, flushing a little at the sudden attention. “What? I like numbers.”

“Jeez, Dan, you’re like the math geek who crashed the cool kids’ pool party uninvited,” Ross teases. Dan splashes him repeatedly with ever-growing waves of water. Suzy rushes over to reclaim and rescue her hat.

The rain picks up quickly - before long everyone’s huddled underneath the tiny overhang, watching the rain pour down into the pool. 

“Well, I guess the party’s over,” Ross pouts and folds his arms like a dejected toddler.

“It was a great party,” Dan tells him, patting him on the shoulder. “Maybe, uh, check the forecast before you throw the next one, though.”

“Nah, I definitely won’t,” Ross confidently replies. “This will be our new tradition - I don’t check the weather, and everyone gets caught in the rain!”

“That’s a great selling point,” Arin says. “You should put that on the flyer.”

“Flyer? What flyer?” Ross asks. “I didn’t pass out any flyers. This isn’t the 90s, Arin.” 

“It’s okay, Ross. I actually have to leave anyway,” Suzy announces. Several people grumble in complaint; Suzy beams. “Well, glad as I am that you all love me so much, I promised someone a badger by 8pm and I don’t wanna let them down!” 

“I suppose you don’t often need a badger, but when you need a badger, you _really_ need a badger,” Allie remarks. Suzy points at her and nods like she got it right.

“You wanna borrow an umbrella, Suze?” Ross asks, surprisingly sweet.

“Whoa, man, you sure didn’t offer any of the rest of us an umbrella!” Dan points out.

“Well, I like Suzy a lot better than the rest of you lot,” Ross replies. “I thought that was common knowledge.”

“That’s so sweet, Ross, but I’ll be alright,” Suzy answers. “I actually like the rain.”

“Well, that’s very goth of you,” Ross grins.

Suzy turns to Arin. “You want me to drop you at home on my way, or are you gonna catch a ride with someone else?”

Arin glances over at Dan by reflex, who shrugs. “Yeah, sure, I’ll drive you home in exchange for a towel,” Dan offers.

“Sold,” Arin agrees. Suzy nods her assent of this plan. Arin beckons her in for a hug. “Hey, you drive safe, okay, Suze? It’s picking up quite a storm. You let me know when you get there safe.”

“Of course!” Suzy throws her arms around him, nuzzling her wet face against his neck. True to her word, her makeup isn’t even smudged. She leans away, looking over at Dan with her cheek smushed against Arin’s collarbone. “And you better take good care of my husband, Daniel.”

“Oh, I will,” Dan promises. “Ross, can I please have that umbrella?”

“What umbrella?” Ross replies, quick as can be, eyes wide and expression innocent.  
  
“Such a gracious host,” Dan snorts. Ross grins, wide and proud of himself. Dan slugs him playfully in the shoulder.

/

Dan’s dark curls are plastered to his high cheekbones, his white Red Hot Chili Peppers t-shirt almost see-through by the time he and Arin run from Dan’s car to Arin’s foyer. Shivering in the doorway and toeing out of his wet sneakers, Dan mutters, “Isn’t this exactly what you described happening in Doodle Date?”

“White shirt and everything,” Arin confirms, offering Dan a towel with one hand and running one through his own hair with the other. Mimi wanders in, mewing softly in greeting.

“Aww! Hi, Mimi!” Dan replies, bending down to pet her with one towel-wrapped hand. She weaves in between his legs. “Oh, Mimi, you’re not gonna wanna…” She pauses when she notices her now-wet fur, pausing right between Dan’s legs and aggressively licking herself once she realizes she’s gotten her fur wet. “Oh my god, Mimi.”

“She’s just as cute as she is dumb,” Arin coos, crouching down to pet her as Dan steps over and away from the slightly damp feline. “Awww, you’re my stupid little baby, yes you _are!”_ Mimi rubs her head against Arin’s palm and stares up at him with vacant, loving eyes. He gets lost in them for a moment, always happy to see her after a long day at work, but then hears Dan audibly shivering and switches his attention back to him.

“Sorry,” Arin says, standing up. “Her eyes are like time vortexes.”

“They really are,” Dan agrees. A shiver runs through his thin frame, he wraps his arms around himself, holding his elbows. “Fuck. Can I please borrow some dry clothes?”

“Of course you can!” Arin gestures him to follow. “You wanna take a shower? You can even take Suzy’s, it’s cleaner.”

“For what you... _do_ , in there, your bathroom is surprisingly clean,” Dan says. Arin laughs, heading down the hall to his bedroom. “But I will take you up on that offer. God, hang on.” Dan stops, abruptly undoing his fly. “I can’t fucking deal with these wet jeans anymore, I’m sorry.” He pauses, his jeans halfway down his thighs and a blush of realization on his cheeks. “Uh, Suzy isn’t coming back super soon, is she?”

“Nah,” Arin assures him. “That badger’s crossing state lines. She won’t be back until late.”

“Aww!” Dan beams, kicking off his jeans into a wet clump on the floor. “Happy travels, flat badger friend!” He winces. “I wish I hadn’t said that. I did _not_ like that it was flat.”

“It felt super weird to touch,” Arin tells him. “I thought it would feel totally flat, like a rug or something, but it didn’t. You could tell that there used to be, like…”

“Stop, stop, I don’t wanna know!” Dan wails, gathering the wet fabric up into his arms. “You are lucky I’m about to shower now, because I need one! _God!”_

“Well, he wasn’t flat anymore when he left,” Arin informs him. “He looked like a real badger. Just like a legit little dude you could just like, see outside!”

“That’s awesome, Suzy does great work,” Dan remarks. By this point they’ve gotten to Arin and Suzy’s bedroom, and Dan exclaims, “Oh, hey, I haven’t been in here in a while, you moved some stuff around!”

“Oh, yeah!” Arin agrees. “Suzy and I are always getting random new stuff that we want in here, so we have to move things around to make room for it all. That’s the chaise I was telling you about, that’s where that black one used to be.” He indicates the chaise lounge at the foot of their bed, the fabric a deep royal purple velvet brocade and the legs an ornate and worn silver. It would be gaudy in most bedrooms, but in Arin and Suzy’s it fits perfectly.

“It’s gorgeous,” Dan says, running his hand over the soft fabric. “You and Suzy have such good taste. I hate decorating. I always just pick out random stuff that I like, and then I get it home and it doesn’t match or fit together at all.” 

“That’s a style in itself,” Arin insists. “That can be really cool. You make it work.” He goes to an antique chest of drawers and pulls out a couple sets of cozy grey sweatpants and two white t-shirts - his workout clothes, he’d just bought a few sets of the same. He hands one of each item to Dan and gestures over his shoulder. “So yeah, you use Suzy’s, I’ll go use mine, and I’ll meet you in the living room?”

“Yeah, sure,” Dan agrees. “It’s really raging outside, I think I need hot cocoa and cartoons.”

“Dude, I am _so_ down for that,” Arin grins. Dan shivers again. “My god, go shower before you freeze.” 

“Okay,” Dan giggles, dashing off into the bathroom. Mochi suddenly peeks his head out from the covers of the bed, meowing for attention. Arin pauses to pet him, scratching behind his soft ears until he hears the water click on and remembers what he set out to do.

Heading down the hallway, Mochi at his heels, Arin walks into his own bathroom and switches the shower on. As the water heats up, he stares at himself in the mirror. His wet hair is falling into his face, so he pushes it back and just stares himself in the eye. Slowly the mirror fills up with fog, his reflection going blurrier and cloudier until he can no longer see himself at all. 

He peels off his wet t-shirt and swim trunks, kicking them off onto the floor rather than throwing the wet clothes into the laundry basket. He steps into the hot shower water and sighs peacefully. 

He knows what’s going to happen. At least, he thinks so - it’s possible tonight won’t end up being the right mood, or the right time, but the way Dan had walked right inside without being asked, and how shocked Arin would've been had Dan done anything else...it says something.

And Arin knows he heard it too - the hidden second question in Suzy’s “can you find another ride home”, the intensity in her voice as she told him to "take good care of my husband.”  And he doesn’t think he misheard the promise in Dan’s voice when he assured her that he would.

They’re sharing a shower on opposite sides of Arin’s house, Arin thinks to himself. That’s not really an intimate act, but it feels like one, feels like it’s sort of a promise of things to come. 

When Arin walks into the living room, Dan’s sitting on the couch. The t-shirt he’s wearing looks baggy and comfy and perfect. He’s already got a cup of cocoa in his hands and a second one on the coffee table. Arin’s not sure what he’s more touched by - the second cup, or the fact that Dan felt comfortable enough in Arin’s kitchen to make himself cocoa in the first place.

“Hey, stranger,” Dan grins. He catches Arin by the hem of his shirt as soon as he’s close enough and drags him down to sit next to him. He sets his cocoa down, heavily, deliberately.

Sliding in close, Dan dips his head for a moment, his wet curls falling forward. Arin pushes them back for him, tucks them behind his ear. Dan’s next breath comes out in a soft shiver. He used Suzy’s soap, he smells like Suzy, a dark floral fragrance that Arin could pick out of a lineup. It’s always calmed him, and it doesn’t fail to now.

“Hey,” Arin replies, his voice soft. “I missed you.”

Dan’s lips are extra warm from the cocoa, tasting extra sweet. Arin melts like chocolate on his tongue.


	12. try again, and again, and again?

“I’ve been thinking about doing that all day,” Dan confesses, breathless and flushed. “I was acting like a kid who ate too much sugar before you showed up, dude. Ross was, like, trying to tell me about some stuff he was working on, but I couldn’t pay attention. I just kept staring at the gate, waiting for you to get there.”

“What’s Ross working on?” Arin asks, grabbing Dan by the hips and pulling him onto his lap.

Dan squirms around to get comfortable - or just to be a tease, it could really be either.  “I dunno,” Dan tells him. “I wasn’t paying attention.” 

He reaches out and traces Arin’s lips with his thumb. “You know, I always watch your mouth when you’re talking lately. I just keep on thinking, like, how crazy is it that I know how it feels to kiss you, now? I didn’t for so long.” 

“You could’ve,” Arin informs him. The room is silent but for the ticking of a large grandfather clock in the corner of the living room and the storm carrying on outside. Arin hears every sound of it as Dan swallows, hard.

“Could I have?” Dan asks. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Arin replies. “Really, man. Pretty much any day since the day we met.”

“What about the actual day we met?” Dan’s grinning, but there’s a soft pink flush over his cheeks. That’s his favorite shade of pink, Arin’s just decided.  “What if I’d just walked into that restaurant, and when you held out your hand and said, like, ‘Arin Hanson, good to meet you’, instead of being all businesslike and saying, like, I dunno, ‘Daniel Avidan, pleasure’s all mine’, I just grabbed you by the face…”  Dan demonstrates, laying each of his hands to frame Arin’s jaw. “Just grabbed your face and laid one on you.”

“How would you have done it?” Arin asks. “Show me.”

“Oh, god,” Dan pauses. “That’s a good question.”

“I was just flirting,” Arin admits. “I just want you to kiss me again.”

“And I will,” Dan promises. “Lots of times, but that’s a good question, dude, I wanna answer it, I wanna get it right.” He bites his lip, tilts his head to the side. “I think…” He leans in close, a hair’s breadth from Arin’s lips. “I think I’d probably just have done this, first, to give you time to back away. I don’t go around kissing people unless I’m _pretty_ goddamn sure they want me to, so I guess I’d have to have gotten some signs…”

“Signs like what?” Arin asks. “Like flirting with you? Because I kinda did that, actually.”

“You did?” Dan gapes, leaning back slightly. “I don’t remember that.”

“It was subtle,” Arin tells him. “But I did. I still remember what I said.”

“What did you say?” 

Arin smiles, suddenly slightly shy. “I told you that your smile really lit up a room,” he says. “And you smiled at that, and then I was like, ‘Wow.’”

“Oh, man,” Dan cries. “I actually do kind of remember that. And Brian, in the car later...he said that you were totally hitting on me, and I told him he was insane, you were just being nice, and besides, you had a girlfriend...”

“No, Brian was right,” Arin admits. “But you can’t ever tell him that.”

“Oh, he’s _long_ since figured it out,” Dan laughs at Arin’s surprised expression. “Arin, he once came to pick me up from my dressing room and found you wearing smudged lipstick, and me covered in lipstick marks and flaunting a boner at full fucking mast. He watched us kiss in a bar once. He, in your own words, full on told you not to fuck me. Brian _absolutely_ knows.”

“That lipstick thing was after you already ate a marshmallow out of my mouth, on camera,” Arin reminds him.

“No, I just licked it out of your mouth,” Dan corrects him. “ _You_ ate it.” Dan blushes. “For weeks, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. My heart felt like it was gonna explode whenever I got near you.”

“Really? You acted so chill,” Arin remarks.

“I have a good poker face,” Dan waves him off. 

“You know, uh, when Suzy said I could kiss you at that bar, I was seriously so afraid you’d laugh and say absolutely not,” Arin tells him. “I was so scared.”

“I would never do that to you,” Dan insists. “Even if I didn’t want to kiss you, I’d have let you down easy. But oh my god, I was super scared too. I wasn’t sure, like, if I got to kiss you, that I’d ever be able to look you in the eye again. Or Suzy, for that matter.” He smiles. “But she’s so amazing, dude. She told me over at the jukebox that night in no uncertain terms that I had her full blessing to, and I quote, ‘keep falling in love with her beautiful husband.’” He ducks his head, laughing softly. “I almost cried, dude.”

“Getting a lump in my throat right now, to be honest,” Arin admits, swallowing hard.

“No, no, no, hey...” Dan assures him, carding a hand through Arin’s hair and letting it rest there, comfortably tangled in the strands. “Hey. You asked how I’d have kissed you if I kissed you the first night we met?” Arin nods, Dan brings his other hand back to Arin’s face.  “Probably a lot like that night in the bar,” Dan tells him. “Soft, and like, careful.”

“Show me,” Arin urges. “Please?”

Dan brushes their lips together, and it’s just as soft and careful as promised; he’s kissing Arin so gently, like Arin’s made of porcelain and if Dan presses too hard, Arin might crumble to pieces. It sends pleasant little shivers through Arin’s entire body, making all his nerves light up bright. There’s a feral part of him that wants to tangle his fingers in Danny’s hair and kiss him breathless, but the soft shivery way Dan’s brushing his lips against Arin’s is too good to interrupt.

When Dan leans away, Arin smiles. “So uh, Arin Hanson, good to meet you,” Arin says.

Dan laughs, the sound a deep rumble in his chest. “Daniel Avidan,” he grins. “Pleasure’s all mine.”

“Not yet, it’s not,” Arin mutters, leaning forward and nipping lightly at his neck. Dan lets out a soft, broken little noise, and Arin feels Dan’s dick twitch through both of their sweatpants. Well, both of Arin’s sweatpants, technically. It hits Arin that, if all goes according to plan, he’s going to be taking his own clothes off Dan’s body.

“Your bedroom’s very nice,” Dan remarks. “I’d really love to take another look at it, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Sure thing,” Arin agrees. “I’ll give you a whole grand tour of the whole house, if you want.” 

Dan bites his lip, squirms a little on Arin’s lap. “Just the bedroom for now, please.”

Arin laughs. “Since you asked so nicely.”

The bedroom still smells of Suzy’s soap from Dan’s shower, the room still slightly inundated with steam. As soon as Arin closes the door, Dan pins him against it and kisses him soundly. Arin’s hands find Dan’s hips, sliding up beneath the loose t-shirt to explore warm, soft skin. 

“I could kiss you forever,” Dan tells him. 

“You totally can,” Arin replies. He kisses him again, briefly, then leans back to add, “We’d just have to take occasional breaks.” And kisses him again. “And it might make recording a little difficult, but fuck it, we’ll figure it out.” 

Dan giggles. “You know, we probably _could_ post a Grump episode of us just hardcore making out. I think the fans would forgive us for just _one.”_

“Are you kidding me?” Arin snorts. “We could make it a long-running series.” 

Arin directs Dan over to the bed; they sit together in the center of it, facing each other. Dan swallows, reaching out and gently tucking a lock of hair behind Arin’s ear. He bites his lip. “I can’t believe I get to do this with you,” Dan tells him. “I never thought...I always thought this part of our relationship was off-limits, just like, locked away forever, out of reach and untouchable.”

“I know what you mean,” Arin agrees. “I remember when every kiss felt like a fluke, and you might change your mind any minute.” He pauses. “But then again, at the same time, it kinda felt inevitable, I don’t know.”

“I kinda get that,” Dan nods. “Like...how can I love a person this much, and _not_ wanna have sex with them?” 

“That’s a very Sexbang way to put it,” Arin laughs. “But that about sums it up, yeah.”

 “I tried to, like, explain everything away, too, like...yeah, I spend a lot of time wondering what it would be like to kiss Arin, but that’s just natural scientific curiosity! Sure, yeah, I do think his ass looks great in those tiny shorts, but that’s just normal aesthetic appreciation!”

“God, yeah,” Arin says. “The amount of times I said to myself ‘Sure, of course I kinda wanna fuck Dan, but who doesn’t?’”

Dan giggles. “You just _really_ want me to bottom for you, huh?”

“I don’t really care who does what, honestly,” Arin admits. “I just wanna touch you, and have you touch me.”

“Well, that’s very sweet,” Dan smiles. “But no, you’re supposed to say yes, you do really want me to bottom for you, and then I get to tell you I’ve been fingering myself for weeks now, thinking of you, trying to get ready for you, and then you’d look all surprised and turned on.” He grins. “Yeah, there we go. That’s the face I was expecting, exactly that.”

“You’ve been…” Arin swallows. The mental image of Dan, all spread out on his bed, thrusting his fingers inside himself, seeking out his sweet spot, moaning and gasping and writhing, all with Arin in mind...it’s blanking out every other thought in his brain. “Jesus, really?”

“Yep,” Dan lets out a bashful little giggle, blushing and ducking his head to hide behind a curtain of curls. “And now I kinda can’t believe I just told you that but yeah, I, uh. I have.”

Arin’s mouth is dry. He licks his lips, whispers, “Get the fuck over here, right _fucking_ now.” 

Dan giggles again, crawling over the small bit of bed between them and into Arin’s lap. His eyes widen when he feels Arin’s hard dick poke him in the inner thigh. “Oh, uh, hello there.”

“Don’t act fuckin’ surprised,” Arin retorts. “You just told me you finger yourself while thinking of me, _fuck.”_

“I mostly think about how you’d be much better at fingering me than I am at fingering myself,” Dan admits. “I’m kind of bad at it, to tell you the truth.” He bites his lip. “I always imagined…” He shivers a little, Arin feels it as much as he sees it. “Well, I have a pretty vivid imagination.”

“You want me to show you?” Arin offers. “You wanna find out what it’d be like for real?”

“I kinda wanna do everything and anything with you,” Dan tells him. He pauses. “Well, not everything. I’m a pretty vanilla dude.” He tucks his hair behind his ear and grins sheepishly. “But yeah, you dirty talkin’ bastard, I’ve been thinking about you fucking me ever since you painted me such a _vivid_ mental picture of it in our dressing room.”

“God. How the fuck did I get this lucky?” 

“Don’t go getting all sappy on me, Hanson,” Dan says, but he leans forward and kisses Arin anyway, right on the cheekbone, right beneath his eye, as if preemptively kissing his tears away. “I’m not into crying during sex, hopefully that’s not a dealbreaker.”

“You have a whole _song_ about crying during sex,” Arin points out, but he slides a hand up underneath Dan’s t-shirt, slowly pushing it up his chest as Arin’s fingers explore his skin. Arin’s eyes stay on Dan’s face, watching every slight shift in facial expression as he reacts to Arin’s touch, from suppressed giggles as Arin accidentally tickles his ribs to the soft anticipatory look of pleasant surprise as Arin’s thumb briefly goes near his nipple, only to skip the area completely and instead focus on tugging the shirt up and off over Dan’s head. Tossing the borrowed shirt away over the side of the bed, Arin gently tips Dan backwards onto the bed, his legs still tangled around Arin’s hips. 

Dan looks incredible from this angle. Arin spends a moment just tracing his eyes over the flat lines of Dan’s stomach, the light dusting of dark hair across his chest, even the artistically pleasing yin and yang contrast between the crescent of his lower ribcage and the crescents of his hips. Just drinking it all in before finally ultimately focusing on Dan’s nipples - the rosy, pebble-hard peaks seem to be just begging for Arin’s attention.

Arin takes his time, curving a hand up from Dan’s hip, letting his thumb brush the thin trail of hair leading down to the waistband of his sweatpants, running a hand along his chest. Dan lets out another anticipatory gasp; the breath comes out as a breathy sigh of a moan as Arin finally brushes his thumb over a nipple. He focuses on just one at first, exploring every inch of the sensitive little circle of rosy pink skin, until Dan lets out a soft little “Please,” and Arin lets his other hand find the other one. He pinches both of them at the same time, and Dan’s hips arch up off the bed so hard Arin almost loses his balance. The cry that comes out of Dan’s mouth is just _sinful_ , a rough-edged noise that sounds like it was absolutely dragged out of him. 

“It’s wild to me how much you like having your nips played with,” Arin remarks, all casually, like they’re recording the show and discussing a unique game mechanic or something. “Mine honestly don’t really do anything for me. I can take it or leave it. Suzy can get into it, but she has to be in a specific mood or she doesn’t like it, like, at all. You, though…” Arin draws little circles around the bud; Dan squirms on the bed, writhing his hips in almost a sloppy figure-8. “God, you’re just real into it, all the time. It’s _crazy_ hot.”

“Thanks, it sure was a fun discovery in the course of my masturbation exploration,” Dan laughs, a little breathlessly. “I could, uh…” He pauses to laugh again, softer, slightly embarrassed. “I used to be able to get off just from that. I still _technically_ can now, but it takes a lot more effort.” 

“We should try it sometime,” Arin tells him.

“We should,” Dan agrees. “Not today, though.”

“Not today,” Arin assures him. “But, uh…” Arin leans forward and lathes his tongue slowly, wetly, over Dan’s nipple. Dan’s fingers curl into his hair, holding him there. Arin indulges him, sucking briefly on the sensitive little bud until Dan uses his hold in Arin’s hair to pull him away rather than keep him in place. Dan's head is tilted back against the bed, and Arin can’t resist the devious urge to press a quick kiss to that spot between Dan’s earlobe and his jawline that Arin’s memorized well by now.

“ _Arin,_ ” Dan hisses. “Are you _trying_ to make me come in my pants?”

“Technically they’re my pants,” Arin points out. “And no, not really. I already did that. I wanna do something new.” He toys with the tie on the sweatpants - Dan had to pull the drawstring of the waist extra tight to keep Arin’s baggy sweats in place on Dan’s skinny hips. “Like maybe see your dick for once. You know I made you come without ever even getting to see your dick? That feels like a scam, to me.”

“You’re right,” Dan agrees, grinning. “I’m so sorry. Tell you what - how ‘bout this time, you get to see my dick, and _also_ , you get to fuck me.”

“That seems fair,” Arin says, trying to keep an even tone and mostly not succeeding. Dan smirks at the telltale quiver in Arin’s voice, and Arin pinches a nipple to wipe the look off his face. 

“Arin, fuck,” Dan cries. “Dude, if you don’t want jizz in these sweatpants, they need to come off me like, _right_ the fuck now.”

“Noted,” Arin says. He undoes the tie, reminding him of fixing the corseted back of the crop top Dan had modeled for Suzy. As soon as the tie is undone and the waistband goes loose they slip down, exposing about an inch more skin and slightly thicker, darker curls. Just that little bit more exposure has Arin’s heart racing. He’s imagined what Dan might look like naked countless times, it feels almost surreal that it’s actually happening in person.

Dan sits up, scooting back slightly on the bed. “I don’t mind winning the nudity race, but you gotta catch up eventually,” he informs him. He tugs gently on the hem of the t-shirt that Arin’s still wearing. “Mind if I take this off?”

It’s almost textbook verbiage for checking for consent, it could’ve easily come off sounding awkward and scripted or just outright inexperienced coming from someone else, but coming from Dan, with so much confidence in his voice and so much affection in his warm brown eyes, it’s somehow both very sweet and _insanely_ hot. “Go for it,” Arin tells him, lifting his arms to help him along. 

It’s off over his head in one quick instant. Dan doesn’t spend much time looking at the newly exposed skin, maybe sensing that it could make Arin uncomfortable or perhaps just because it’s nothing new, no part of Arin is exposed that Dan hasn’t seen before. 

Either way, Dan kisses Arin the second he has the shirt off over his head, exploring Arin’s bare chest with his hands instead, then sliding his hands slowly down Arin’s arms, leaving goosebumps in his wake. They’re both up on their knees, face-to-face and shirtless, kissing on Arin’s bed. It just doesn’t ever stop feeling surreal, but in a good way, not in a way that takes Arin out of the moment but instead just makes him appreciate it even more. 

Dan leans back, his thumbs on Arin’s jaw and his fingers half-buried in the hair at the nape of Arin’s neck. “Hey,” he says, his lips kissed extra pink and his pupils blown wide with arousal. “So, you know I’m in love with you, right?”

Arin blinks in surprise. “Yeah,” Arin replies. “Of course. I’m in love with you too.”

“I know,” Dan grins. “I just...I had to make sure you knew that for sure, before we went any further.” 

He chews on his lip, the corners quirking up into a smile. He looks into Arin’s eyes briefly before averting eye contact, suddenly slightly shy even as he boldly grabs hold of the waistband of the borrowed sweatpants and drags them swiftly to his knees. 

He glances back up, his gaze full of nothing but confidence now as Arin drinks in every last inch of newly exposed skin. And there are, uh, a lot of inches.

“I thought you said you’d been lying,” Arin cries. “Are you _actually_ seven inches?” It’s not just large, either, but gorgeous too, the exact kind of cock Arin would watch a porn video for if he saw it in the thumbnail. Not overly thick or overly slender, getting more and more flushed with pink as you go from the blush-colored shaft to the pinkish-red tip; its gentle upward curve has it brushing against Dan’s stomach as he untangles the sweatpants from around his ankles.

“And three quarters, yeah,” Dan giggles, kicking the sweatpants off the bed. “I was actually lying about lying.” 

“Why would you pretend to _not_ have an almost eight inch dick?” Arin demands. 

“I dunno, man,” Dan shrugs. “Cuz people just kept talking about it, and accusing me of lying about it, and I couldn’t really prove it was true, not unless I wanted to post a pic of my junk online, so I just said I was joking to stop people from talking about it.”

“You are really good at that,” Arin tells him. “You steer a lot of potential shit away from the channel before it even starts.”

“I’m getting a performance review from my boss while I’m on his bed with my dick out,” Dan points out.

“Sorry,” Arin says. “Or you’re welcome, depending on how you feel about that.”

“Feel pretty good about it,” Dan replies. “Could probably feel even better.” He sprawls out on the silky black comforter, fixing Arin with a heated gaze and a seductive smirk. “If you felt so inclined, that is.”

“I feel very inclined,” Arin informs him. “Possibly the most inclined I’ve ever felt in my life, to be honest.”

Dan grins. “So do something about it, then.”


	13. and again, and again, and again?

Arin immediately kisses him, because how else are you going to react to a challenge like that coming from a man that beautiful lying naked on your bed? Dan hooks a leg around Arin’s hip while Arin’s laying next to him, trying to pull Arin on top of him.

“Eager,” Arin accuses, grinning.

“Yeah, no shit,” Dan giggles. He kisses him again, softly, and tucks a lock of hair behind Arin’s ear, lightly teasing the shell of his ear with his fingers. It’s incredible how every single time Dan kisses him, no matter how many times it happens, it’s always enough to make Arin’s head spin. Dan _really_ knows how to kiss, and loves showing off his skills. If Arin and Suzy hadn’t gotten to spend the last several decades gradually discovering how to kiss each other better and better, Arin might have been slightly out of his depth, unable to keep up. Going by the stunned, starstruck look Dan often has when they break apart for air, Arin has a feeling Dan’s very used to kissing people senseless, and is far less accustomed being kissed into breathlessness himself. It makes Arin want to kiss him all the more, and all the better. Keeps him on his toes, so to speak.

Running his fingers through Arin’s hair and combing through the silky strands, Dan gently guides Arin into the perfect angle to kiss him even harder and deeper, his fingers gently stroking at the back of Arin’s neck when he finds the perfect angle, his feather-light fingers giving Arin goosebumps. He wraps his leg around Arin’s waist again, and this time Arin acquiesces, rolling over so that his knees are framing Dan’s hips.

Dan’s been letting his hands roam lazily over Arin’s chest with no real purpose, but now that they’ve reached Arin’s hips, he keeps them there, thumbing at the soft cotton of Arin’s sweatpants, the only thing keeping Arin clothed, in stark comparison to Dan’s full nudity. 

He doesn’t interrupt the kiss, but when they break apart for breath, Dan hooks his both thumbs into the waistband and asks, “Can I…?”

Arin immediately nods but also immediately kisses him again, needing the distraction. He’s not the most modest guy in the world, not by a long shot, but it’s still been ages, like, fucking _decades_ since he’s been undressed for the first time by a new lover, and there’s a harsh squirm of unease in the pit of his stomach; he needs Dan to kiss it away for him.

Dan eases Arin’s pants down his thighs with his hands, then finishes the job with his toes and kicks them over the side of the bed once they’re off. The slight downward curve to Arin’s cock has it brushing against Dan’s stomach once the sweatpants aren’t there to hold it close to Arin’s body, and the feeling of it immediately makes the situation feel more intimate and heated. That heat increases tenfold when Dan grabs Arin’s hips and eases him down, pressing their bodies tight together. 

“Fuck,” Dan breathes. “Arin, this is surreal.” 

“Are you good?” Arin asks.

Dan nods immediately, pushing his curls out of his flushed face. “I’m _very_ good,” he tells him. He rolls his hips against Arin’s, who enjoys the friction but even more enjoys watching Dan’s expression shift as he seems to surprise himself with how good it ends up feeling, his mouth opening in equal shock and arousal. 

Before Dan can fully regain composure, Arin lifts his hips up slightly, adjusts the angle slightly, and then in one smooth motion drags the head of his cock right along the shaft of Dan’s, sliding against the tip at the very last second before abruptly pulling away. Dan stutters out a series of sounds that aren’t quite words. 

“Yeah? You sure you’re good?” Arin asks, smirking. He does it again, slower this time, swivelling his hips slightly, rubbing the sensitive heads of their cocks together. Dan’s cock leaks, making the slide even easier as Arin immediately repeats the motion, unable to keep from groaning out loud as Dan clutches at his arms, his nails slightly biting into the skin. He knows Dan isn’t one to be rough in bed, that it’s entirely out of pleasure. If he reacts this strongly to grinding, Arin can’t imagine how he’ll be when Arin’s actually fucking him. 

“Fuck, god, _Arin,_ ” Dan cries, as if reading his mind. “Please, _please_ fuck me.”

“Yeah, okay,” Arin agrees. “I’m kinda losing my shit over here anyway, I really can’t fuckin’ tease you anymore.”

“Well, yeah. You can’t tease _my_ cock with _your_ cock,” Dan advises. “You just end up teasing yourself, too.”

“Felt really good, though,” Arin tells him, sitting up and scooting back. Dan swallows, licking his lips, drinking in the sight of Arin’s nude form. Arin’s too turned on to feel bashful, spreading his thighs a little to give Dan a better look. 

And Dan’s curls are spilling all over the black silk pillowcase, and his lips are slightly swollen, and his pupils are blown to shit, and there’s this soft pink flush cast over his cheeks...Arin doesn’t even have to look at his cock to be turned on but he does anyway, and bites his lip at the sight of that gorgeous dick steadily leaking pre-cum onto Dan’s flat stomach. 

“Fuck me?” Dan reminds him.

“Working on it,” Arin promises. He sits on the edge of the bed and tugs the antique brass handle on the drawer of a dark mahogany nightstand, rummaging through a variety of vibrators and dildos and other assorted bedroom-type items until he finds a small bottle of lube. He can’t help but grin as he puts everything back into its place - it’s obvious that he and Suzy clearly have a wildly enjoyable and adventurous sex life already. He definitely, 100% would’ve been happy sleeping with only Suzy for the rest of his life...and then Suzy turned around and let him have this, too. He’s absolutely buying her flowers. He’s buying her and Dan _both_ flowers. Some black dahlias for Suzy, something blue for Dan...fuck, he might even buy Ross some flowers, for having that pool party and being too damn Ross-like to bother to check the weather. What kind of flowers does Ross even like, anyway?

“Do you think Ross likes daisies?” Arin asks, swinging his legs back up onto the bed. 

That startles a laugh out of Dan. “Arin, what the fuck does that have to do with anything?” he demands.

“Just thinking about stuff,” Arin replies, grabbing Dan’s knees and then stopping. “Oh, are you cool with being like this, on your back? Or do you want to turn over, get on your knees?”

“Jesus,” Dan breathes. He pauses, considering. “Uh, on my knees feels a little too porn-y, and besides, I wanna see your face.”

“I wanna see _your_ face,” Arin agrees.

Dan laughs. “Well, that’s good,” he says. “We shouldn’t be having sex with each other in the first place if we don’t like looking at each other’s faces.”

And yeah, okay, Arin’s not stupid, he obviously knew that’s what they were doing, but having it out there in the open makes Arin feel like he’s thirteen again. He’s about to _have sex._ With _Dan._ The same Dan that’s sat beside him on the Grump couch, whose ass he’d quietly ogled every time he wore his tightest jeans, who he’s been privately nursing a crush on and also privately berating himself _for_ having a crush on for years and years and _years_ now. That very same man is now in his bed, naked, fully erect, and repeatedly asking to get fucked. By Arin, specifically. It’s absolutely fuckin’ wild.

With their position now confirmed and agreed upon, Arin pushes Dan’s knees up toward his shoulders. Dan blushes hard, no doubt feeling incredibly exposed. Arin wants to kiss his worries away, but he’s not sure Dan’s flexible enough to handle being bent to that angle, so instead Arin has Dan grab his own knees so that Arin can roll a nipple between the thumb and forefinger on his left hand, giving Dan something else to focus on. 

With his right, he flips the cap open on the lube bottle. Even as he’s gasping with pleasure from the nipple stimulation, Dan still swallows audibly at the sound of the bottle opening. Arin promises him, “I’ll warn you before I actually finger you, right now I’m just getting you ready for it.”

“Okay,” Dan agrees. Arin withdraws his hand from his nipple momentarily to roll the small bottle rapidly between his hands, warming up the lube - a trick he learned from Suzy. Once it’s sufficiently warmed, he drips the lube onto his index and middle fingers, then closes the cap, tosses the bottle to the side, and goes back to massaging Dan’s chest.

“Alright, so I’m gonna try touching you - no fingering though, just touching for now,” Arin explains, and after Dan nods his approval, Arin finally, gently touches Dan’s tiny pink hole. Dan instantly makes a noise like a goose might make if you stepped on it, startling sharply away from Arin’s fingers. Arin of course makes no attempt to hold him there, instead withdrawing his hand as quickly as he can. 

“Sorry,” Dan breathes; Arin shakes his head to assure him the apology is unnecessary. “I didn’t expect it to feel... _god._ Quite like that. It was almost like an electric shock.”

“It’s okay, it takes some getting used to,” Arin assures him. “Do you want me to try again, or do you…”

“No, go ahead,” Dan says. “I think I’m ready for it now... _oooooh...kay.”_ His head tips back against the pillow as Arin brings his fingers back to where they were. “Okay, _yeah,_ that’s still intense, but I’m…” He sucks in a sharp breath as Arin moves his fingers, circling them around the tiny hole, trying to spread the lube around as best he can. “ _Fuck_ , Arin. It feels so different when it’s you, compared to doing it to myself.”

“Yeah,” Arin agrees. “It’s different when Suzy does it than when I do it, too. You’re doing good, though.” He presses gently, not quite slipping inside but getting damn close to it. “You alright? You ready? Can I, uh, can I try and finger you, or do you need more time?” 

 _“Ohhh_ my _god,”_ Dan cries, caught between squirming against Arin’s fingers and shifting away from them. “Yeah, okay, do it. Just go slow.” He takes in a shaky breath, then gives Arin a shaky smile. “It’s my, uh, first time, after all.”

A sharp flash of heat shoots through Arin’s body at that phrasing, but he tries to play it cool. “I'll go slow,” Arin tells him. “Just take a deep breath. And tell me if anything hurts, cuz it’s definitely not supposed to. Don’t you dare try and tough it out.” 

“I will. Tell you, I mean,” Dan promises. 

Arin slowly, gently eases his index finger into the tight, warm heat. One of Dan’s hands tightly grips the comforter, the other squeezes the pillow he’s lying on. “Don’t clench,” Arin advises. “Just try and relax. Does it hurt?”

“No,” Dan claims, but his face is all scrunched up and Arin’s still worried. “It’s just...kinda weird feeling. I think I can get used to it if you just, uh...just add another one?”

“Add another finger?” Arin asks. “Already? Dude, are you sure? You _just_ asked me to go slow.”

“I just meant to put it in me slow,” Dan clarifies. “C’mon, please, Arin, I _need_ it…”

“Okay, alright,” Arin agrees. “You don’t have to beg. I’ll do it, but if it hurts…”

“I’ll fucking tell you if it hurts, dude,” Dan insists, growing impatient. “Just do it,  _ah_ , fuck…” Arin _very_ slowly and tentatively slides his middle finger in to join his index, ready to stop at any moment, and is pleasantly surprised when Dan lets out a sharp, keening moan. “God, _yes,_ that’s so much better. One felt super weird, but the stretch of two is…” He lets out a soft, shuddering cry, just about the polar opposite of his last one. “It’s so _fucking_ good, Arin.”

“Yeah, man, I told you,” Arin grins. “I fuckin’ knew you’d love this. Here, let me…” Arin slides his fingers in deeper, crooking them gently, seeking out Dan’s prostate. The second Arin feels like he found it, Dan immediately slams a fist down against the bed and lets out a sobbing, pornographic-sounding moan that rivals Brian’s snoring in its wall-shaking volume.

“Oh my god, you have to fuck me, god, _please,_ ” Dan gasps. The hand that had been grasping the pillow is fisted in his own hair and his cheeks are as red as Arin’s ever seen them. His eyes go from squeezed closed to fluttering open, and the heat in them matched with the glaze to them has Arin’s heart pounding hard. " _Please_ just fuck me, Arin.”

“You’re not ready for my cock yet,” Arin insists as he thrusts his fingers slowly, repeatedly seeking out Dan’s sweet spot. “You’re _way_ too tight right now. It’d split you in two.”

“You’re too good at dirty talk,” Dan accuses between gasps and cries. “It’s… _fuck_ , not at all fair.”

“I wasn’t even trying to dirty talk,” Arin laughs. “I’m just stating a fact. I gotta spread you open more, or my cock’s not gonna even fucking fit in that tiny little ass of yours.” He scissors his fingers inside him to demonstrate. “I’m working on it, but you are still crazy tight.”

“Fuck, _yes_. I’m so tight for you, spread me the fuck open, nice and wide,” Dan gasps, his babbling so obviously purely stream of consciousness, blatantly unfiltered. “God, I’m yours, I’m yours, tell me I’m yours…”

Arin raises his eyebrows - that’s not a kink he knew Dan had, but it’s one he’s more than glad to go along with. “Dude, of course you’re mine. You’re all mine,” Arin agrees. “I love that I’m the only one who’s ever gotten to see you like this and do this to you.”

“Yes,” Dan cries. “Fuck, I love you so much, Arin.”

“I love you too,” Arin tells him. He spreads his fingers as wide as he can inside of Dan and then asks, gently as he can, “Dan, do you _legit_ think you’re ready for me to fuck you now? Tell me honestly, cuz I’d seriously never forgive myself if I hurt you.”

“Yes, yes, Arin, I promise,” Dan insists. “Please, I just wanna feel you inside me. I just wanna come with your cock inside of me, Arin, _please.”_

“Okay,” Arin finally agrees, and Dan lets out a moan just at that. He whimpers a little when Arin withdraws his fingers from inside of him. “Just a sec,” Arin promises, grabbing the little bottle of lube again and using it to slick up his cock. His dick is so hard, he’s so insanely turned on, that it’s actually quite difficult not to just lose himself to the feeling of his own hand. 

Arin pauses, biting his lip. “Actually? Come here.” He sits back on the bed and beckons Dan forward. Dan raises an eyebrow quizzically, not yet moving, so Arin elaborates, “I want you to ease yourself down onto me, rather than me pushing into you. I want you in control of it, at least at first. If you wanna lay down once I’m inside you, I can lay you back down to actually fuck you, but I need you to get up on my lap for now.”  

Dan blushes and looks like he’s about to say something, but eventually he just nods, sitting up on the bed and then clumsily climbing into Arin’s lap. Arin holds Dan in place with a hand at the small of his back as he carefully lines Arin’s cock up with his own hole, pressing the blunt head to the tight entrance.

 “Fuck,” Dan breathes. “Okay. Here I go, fucking myself in the ass with your dick. Just, y'know, a normal thing we always do.”

“Deep breath,” Arin reminds him. “You can go as slow as you need to.” Dan finds Arin’s hand with his right hand, lacing their fingers together, squeezing tight right as the head of Arin’s cock eases inside of him.

“Oh, fuck,” Dan blurts. He holds himself up on Arin’s shoulders, pausing to breathe. “Fuck, Arin, you’re _huge.”_  

“Is it too much?” Arin asks. “We can…”

“No,” Dan insists. “No, it doesn’t hurt or anything, I just…” He presses his forehead to Arin’s, panting. He slides down about another inch and chokes out a sharp cry. “God, how am I _doing_ this? It feels like your dick’s only maybe about an inch less in circumference than my entire body. How the _fuck_ is it inside me right now?”

“It’s not _that_ big,” Arin reminds him. “You just saw it. Anything feels big inside you if you’re not used to it. Do you need to stop? It’s okay, we can just…”

“No,” Dan says again. “No, it’s good, I wanna…” He takes another couple inches, this time his expression abruptly shifts into one of surprised pleasure. “Oh, wow, okay. That’s…” 

“Better?” Arin asks. 

“Much,” Dan agrees. “Oh, that’s... _wow_. Okay. Now I understand why people like this.” He squirms a little and then abruptly lets out a loud moan. “Oh, Arin, that’s _perfect_ , right there.” He sinks down a little further and then squirms a little, his cock brushing Arin’s stomach.

“You just found your prostate,” Arin explains. There’s only a little over an inch left to take, and it’s Arin’s turn to let out a moan as Dan sinks down onto all of it in one motion, taking him down to the hilt. “Dan,  _fuck_ , are you…”

“I’m great, I’m _so_ good,” Dan quickly assures him. “Fuck me hard, Arin, please, I can take it.”

“You want me to lay you back down?” Arin asks, a little bit breathlessly. “Or would you, uh, rather just bounce on my dick?”

“Oh, fuck,” Dan gasps. “Wow. I’ve had girls do that to me, I never thought I’d be the one doing it to someone else. Yeah, let’s try it.” He eases his hips up and then sinks back down, slowly. His and Arin’s moans are in perfect musical harmony as they both cry out together at the sensation. “Okay fuck, yeah, that’s nice, but no, actually, I want you to really _fuck_ me.” 

Arin immediately wraps his arms around Dan’s back and then gently eases him back down onto the bed, his cock still nestled deep inside his ass, grabbing a small purple throw pillow and slipping it beneath Dan's hips. As soon as Dan’s comfortably in place, Arin eases in and out a few times, slowly, gauging Dan’s reaction. Every movement, every slight shift comes with a change in expression, but they’re all good, so Arin keeps going, thrusting much harder and faster now that he’s fairly confident Dan can take it.

Dan’s cries keep rising in volume and pitch, his hips rising to meet each thrust, matching Arin’s rhythm perfectly. Dan's legs stay wrapped around Arin’s hips at first but eventually he throws one long leg over Arin’s shoulder, trying to keep him at the best angle to most frequently hit his sweet spot. Arin takes advantage of the new position to get one hand on Dan’s chest and one on his back, pinching and teasing his nipples and stroking along his spine at the same time, flicking his thumb over those cute, sensitive little lower back dimples whenever he can. 

To Arin’s surprise, Dan grabs Arin’s hand away from his nipple and laces their fingers together, squeezing tight. At first Arin thinks Dan just doesn’t like nipple play during actual sex, but then he realizes Dan had liked it too much - it had gotten him too close to coming, and Dan’s trying to drag this out. The thought of that almost has Arin losing it, and he squeezes Dan’s hand just as tight in return.

“I can feel you pulsing inside me,” Dan tells him. He’s talking fast, and breathy, once again clearly just babbling out whatever comes to mind. “I can feel every fucking detail of your cock, fuck. I feel so good. You’re filling me up so nice, ahhh, _god_.” 

He grabs Arin’s hair in his free hand, pulling slightly and guiding him to his throat. Arin presses some light kisses to the skin and feels it as Dan swallows, hard. “No, I, uh,” Dan pants heavily, chest heaving, almost unable to speak coherently. “F-fuckin’...want you to bite me, bruise me.”

“Want everyone to know you’re mine?” Arin knows he’s taking a risk in saying that. It could easily sour the atmosphere a little if Dan’s not into it, but Arin has a feeling he’s got Dan’s newly-revealed possessiveness kink pretty well figured out already.

“Yes _,_ _fuck,_ ” Dan cries, his nails biting slightly into the back of Arin’s hand. “I’m...I really want everyone to wonder...a-and to ask me w-where I got it, and…” He shudders, legs clenching even tighter around Arin’s body. “We both get to know it’s from you.”

And with that, Arin knows exactly where to go and what to do. Pressing his lips to Dan’s favorite little sweet spot, he sucks gently, scraping his teeth lightly over the skin. Despite Dan’s wording, Arin knows he’s not so much seeking out the pain so much as the bruising, so he works to make the hickey as dark as he can without actually sinking his teeth into Dan’s skin any harder than he has to.

Dan whines and keens, gripping at Arin’s hair and still squeezing his hand tightly in his own. “Oh, fuck,” he whimpers. “Arin, fuck, it feels too good, I’m gonna…”

Arin, his lips brushing Dan’s skin as he speaks, mere inches from his ear, murmurs, “You gonna come for me, Danny?” 

They’ve done an awful lot together now; Arin’s gotten to hear Dan make all kinds of noises, but none have been quite as sweet or as sinful as the sound he makes as Arin fucks him right through his orgasm. Dark lashes on flushed cheeks, his lips kissed swollen and red, he moans _beautifully_ as his cock twitches and shoots pearlescent white all over his own chest. 

Arin’s so focused on watching him, he doesn’t notice how close to the edge he is himself until he’s already coming. Dan gasps at the feeling of it, deep inside him.

“So turns out you were right,” Dan says, lifting a hand to touch the already almost purple bruise on his throat. “I love getting fucked.” He giggles. “I guess we shouldn’t tell Brian, though, huh?”

“Nah, I think that was just a one-time warning,” Arin replies, grabbing one of their t-shirts off the floor - it’s impossible to tell whose was whose now - and using it to clean himself off. “I think he just didn’t want us staying up all night, fondling each other in the next bed over from him.”

“I guess that’s at least semi-understandable,” Dan giggles.

“Plus, he really more just alluded to it, anyway,” Arin adds. He finishes cleaning himself and offers the shirt to Dan. “He kept on saying that we should ‘just go right to sleep’ and vaguely stated that he noticed we’d been acting...I don’t remember exactly how he put it. How we’d been closer lately, basically.”

“Can’t get much closer to someone than literally being inside them,” Dan agrees, taking the shirt and using it to wipe off his chest. “God, and here all this time I thought Brian had somehow, like, sussed me out as being a secret bottom with his big ol’ physicist brain long before I even considered it, but nope, now I find out you just misquoted him.” 

“A lot of good things start with a misquote,” Arin tells him as he lies back on the bed. 

“Like what?” Dan asks, tossing the shirt in the general vicinity of a hamper and curling up next to him.

“I dunno,” Arin admits. He wraps an arm around Dan, pulling him in close. “Ask me again when I’m less come-dumb.”

“Fair,” Dan agrees, laying down on his chest. “Very fair.”

Some number of hours later, Dan’s awoken by the sound of the bedroom door creaking open. Arin’s sprawled out on his back, breathing deep in his sleep, and Dan’s got his head on Arin’s chest, having let his heartbeat lull him to sleep.

Blinking his eyes open, he meets Suzy’s gaze. She smiles at him, warm and loving. “Hey, Danny,” she says. “How was it?”

“Amazing,” Dan tells her. She grins, wide and genuine. “I’m sure Arin will tell you in the morning.” Dan knows he should leave so Suzy can go to bed, but he can’t resist the urge to steal just a few extra seconds in Arin’s arms before he has to go.

“You can both tell me,” she replies, sitting on the end of the bed to slip her shoes off. “I really don’t think you’re going anywhere else tonight.”

“Really? Are you sure you don’t want your bed back?” Dan asks. His eyes widen as Suzy stands up and starts shimmying out of her jeans. “Whoa, Suzy…”

“I figured we could just share?” Suzy offers. Dan’s eyebrows shoot up in shock; she puts her hands up in defense. “Hey, don’t get me wrong, we definitely don’t have to do anything other than sleep. I legit just wanna cuddle with you guys. But if that’s not cool, I absolutely, totally understand, and there’s a perfectly comfy guest bedroom right down the hall I'd be more than happy to go crash in.” She smiles at him gently. “Either way, there’s no way I’m pulling you out of his arms. That’d just be cruel.”

“I mean, we can totally share, but I’m...very naked right now,” Dan admits, blushing slightly. “And so is Arin, but I assume you’re pretty used to that by now.”

“Well, then, you can either throw on some clothes or just say fuck it, cuz I’m okay with it if you are,” Suzy replies. 

Dan shrugs and nods, so she comes over to the Dan’s side of the bed, dressed in just a t-shirt and underwear, standing and waiting until Dan takes the hint and snuggles closer to Arin, making more room for Suzy behind him. She slips beneath the blankets, throwing an arm over Dan’s waist. Burying her face against Dan’s shoulder, she sighs peacefully. Her long, soft hair brushes Dan’s back, giving him pleasant goosebumps. 

Arin stirs slightly, feeling the shift in the mattress. He half-opens one eye. “Oh! Hey Suze, glad you’re home.” He yawns. “Mmm. More sleep. Love you both.”

She smiles up at him lovingly. “Hi, Arin. I love you too.”

“Love you too,” Dan agrees. 


	14. epilogue: give me one good solid kiss and i'll be alright

The early morning sun beams warmly in between the blinds, slowly waking Arin up to the scene happening in his bed. Dan is a warm, comfortably heavy weight on his chest, and Suzy’s curled up right behind him, an arm draped protectively over his waist and her cute sleeping face buried against the back of his shoulder. Arin’s pretty sure that her t-shirt and underwear are still the only clothes between the three of them. Dan’s body is pretty thoroughly tangled with Arin’s, and Arin can’t feel a stitch of fabric on him.

Arin carefully, quietly slips out of bed, swiftly slipping a pillow beneath Dan’s head. He’s an old pro at that move now, having had to do it with Suzy since high school. He’s so used to the feeling of having someone use his chest as a pillow that it’s been hard to fall asleep without that comforting weight on Starbomb and Game Grumps Live tours. He supposes that won’t be a problem now. 

Dan stirs slightly but snuggles into the pillow without fully waking up; Arin gently tucks a stray curl behind his ear. Suzy’s arm tightens around his waist, and it’s only then that Arin realizes that they’re holding hands - Dan’s fingers are laced with Suzy’s, holding her hand tight in his sleep. Arin’s heart feels so warm and full, he has to busy himself before he gets too emotional.

He bypasses the pile of clothes on the floor and instead goes to the dresser, grabbing a pair of boxers and a clean t-shirt. Slipping into them, he glances back at the bed. Dan and Suzy look so at home there, so absolutely right with Suzy’s soft curves embracing Dan’s slender form. Sometimes Arin’s sure that, had they met each other before him, they’d have ended up together for sure. The thought doesn’t come with any jealousy, instead he’s just filled with a serene happiness. After all, he supposes, in the end, they sort of did anyway. Just with Arin sandwiched between them, usually.

Arin leaves them to sleep some more, slipping out the door as quietly as he can. All three of the cats are gathered just outside the door, most certainly feeling displaced by last night’s activities. Suzy usually gets up to let the cats in after she and Arin finish having sex, if sex is the last thing they do before bedtime, which is pretty often isn’t. They actually usually end up back in the living room, snuggling together under a thick blanket, watching a movie or playing a video game together for a few hours before the five of them - cat and human alike - all head off to the bedroom together to sleep. Arin bends down and gives each of them in turn an apologetic pat. He thinks they’d understand if he could explain.

Arin closes the door behind him, not letting the cats go into the bedroom despite their clear desire to. Thwarted in that regard, they all follow him into the kitchen. Apparently herding cats isn’t especially hard, at least if they all fucking adore you and want to go where you’re going anyway. Arin presses the button on the cat feeder as he walks by, and food pours down into their bowls. They all line up and chow down; Arin pauses to watch them affectionately for a few moments before walking over to the fridge and examining the contents. When Arin and Suzy first got together, their fridge used to have nothing but a 2-gallon bottle of water that they constantly refilled from the sink over and over again, and a loaf of bread they kept in the fridge to delay molding. That was it. Arin remembered celebrating once because he was able to buy a carton of eggs after a particularly generous tip at the restaurant that he worked at. Now they had a fancy fridge that practically contained half a grocery store. 

Otto is the only one of the three cats who comes to find Arin after they finish eating - Arin strongly suspects at least one if not both of the others went to go wait out the other occupants of the bedroom so they could eventually go sleep on Arin’s bed. Otto hops up on top of the kitchen island, and Arin pets him, gently stroking his soft head. Otto purrs, rubbing up against Arin’s chest, clearly wanting to be held, so Arin scoops him up, letting him rest his front paws and chin on his shoulder.

“Aww, you’re just my big ol’ baby, aren’t ya?” Arin coos. Otto chirps happily, rubbing his head against Arin’s cheek. Arin carries him around the kitchen with him as he gathers up various bowls and other cooking implements, but Otto squirms out of his arms when Arin opens the fridge, spooked by the sudden gust of cold air. He licks at his fur, unsure if he’s wet or just cold. Arin scratches under his chin and then stands up, stepping over him to get to the stove.

He cracks six eggs into a frying pan, two for each of them. He briefly ponders how each of them usually takes their eggs and decides to meet in the middle with scrambled. He adds a bit of butter and a pinch of paprika. It’s not like Dan, or Suzy for that matter, is waiting to see Arin’s cooking skills to decide if they’re going to stick around, but Arin feels the urge to impress anyway. 

Arin sets the waffle maker out to warm up as he mixes in the ingredients for waffle batter together in a large bowl with a pumpkin face on it - one of Suzy’s, for sure. Arin wonders if maybe someday his kitchen will be filled with Dan’s stuff, too. What sorts of things does Dan own, he wonders? He’s been over to Dan’s house a few times, but he’s not sure if Dan was putting on airs, setting out a few of those cute, matching blue cups while a secret cupboard full of mismatched glassware was just out of view somewhere.

Arin pours the waffle batter into the waffle iron, stirs the eggs, and then starts shredding potatoes into a pan. He once watched Dan eat an entire plate of hash browns on a road trip once, only to belatedly realize it was the hash browns that Arin had ordered all along, and Dan himself had never ordered any. He’d been so apologetic, but Arin had known the whole time and had been happy to let him eat it. He’d always been happy to do just about anything that put a smile on Dan’s face. It seems almost absurd that he didn’t know he was in love with him all along. 

As the hash browns cook, Arin drops a few slices of bread into the toaster. Otto runs off down the hall, and Arin knows why a few seconds later when Dan’s voice echoes through the kitchen. “Holy shit, Arin, that smells _amazing.”_

“What are you cooking?” Suzy asks. Arin glances over at them. Dan’s wearing one of the pairs of sweatpants from off the floor, the drawstring untied, leaving them hanging loosely around his hips. He’s got Suzy tucked under his arm, looking adorably comfy in her oversized t-shirt. Arin had been briefly worried that waking up alone together in the same bed would be weird for them, but they’re as cuddly and comfortable together awake as they had been as they slept.

“Kinda just...everything,” Arin replies. “Eggs, hash browns, waffles, toast.” He points at each food in turn as he lists them off. “And there’s orange juice in the fridge. Oh, and I’ll make coffee.”

“I’ll get the coffee,” Suzy offers, slipping out from under Dan’s arm and going up on her toes to reach the mugs on the second shelf. 

Dan looks a little lost without her at his side. “I’ll get the, uh…” He glances around, then looks over at Arin. “What should I...?”

“Waffles?” Arin suggests, pointing to the waffle iron with his elbow. “That one should be ready, if you wanna make a few more.”

“On it,” Dan grins. He steps in close to Arin, reaching over his head and grabbing three plates out of the cabinet. 

The three of them work on their respective tasks in relative silence, reaching over and around each other to grab what they need. Otto comes back, winding around Suzy’s feet until she leaves the coffee to brew and scoops him up, nuzzling and cooing to him in her arms. He watches Dan plating the waffles with pointed interest, but makes no attempt to squirm free of Suzy’s arms and get at the food. Dan pauses to scratch him under the chin while he’s waiting for the next waffle to cook and Dan and Suzy share a smile as Otto purrs loudly in her arms at the attention.

“He loves you,” Suzy tells him.

“Just like everyone else around here,” Arin adds. Dan giggles and blushes.

Eventually the breakfast is done and all three of them have a heaping plate of food. Suzy pours herself and Arin each a cup of coffee, then pours a glass of orange juice for Dan without even having to be asked. They each take a seat at the kitchen island and dig in.

“Oh my god,” Dan cries, mouth full of waffle. “Arin, what the _fuck,_ this is so good!”

“Arin’s an amazing cook,” Suzy grins. “We lucked out.”

“We sure as fuck did,” Dan agrees. His hand goes, seemingly reflexively, to the bruise on his neck. 

Suzy’s grin widens. “Can I see?” she asks.

“Hmm?” Dan glances over at her, then realizes. “Oh! Mmm-hmm.” Gathering up his hair, he pulls it to the side, baring the side of his neck nearest her, the side with the mark on it. “How’s it look? I haven’t seen it yet.”

“Gorgeous,” Suzy replies. She reaches out a hand, then stops short. “May I?” Dan nods, so she gently presses into the mark with her thumb and watches the colors shift, going slightly lighter then returning to the purple, maroon, and green of a new bruise. Dan bites his lip; she quickly retracts her hand. “Sorry. Did I hurt you?”

“No,” Dan quickly insists. “No, I mean, I felt it, but it wasn’t...bad.” He flushes a little. “I’ve always liked that pressing on hickeys kinda makes it feel like you’re getting them all over again.”

“Me too,” Suzy agrees simply, returning to eating. “You did a really good job, Arin. He’s gonna have that for at _least_ a few days.”

“Thanks,” Arin replies, mouth half-full of waffles. He swallows with a sip of coffee. “I was trying to make it dark without biting him too hard.” 

“Aww, but then you don’t get the little teeth marks!” Suzy tugs at the neckline of her oversized t-shirt and shows off a fading bruise on her collarbone. Sure enough, on close inspection, there’s a perfect bite mark illustrated in tiny bruises around the main hickey. “They’re so cute, they’re my favorite part.”

“They _are_ cute,” Dan agrees, inspecting her bruise with his fingertips the same way Suzy had done to his. Arin watches out of the corner of his eye, trying not to stare. “But given the choice, I prefer my sex all pleasure, no pain.”

“Yeah? So then...” Suzy raises her eyebrows, tugs her shirt back into place. “Oh fuck it, I gotta ask.” She looks between the two of them. “Did you guys…? Did he…?”

“Oh, fuck yeah he did,” Arin replies, nodding with a mouth full of toast. Dan whips his head around to stare at him, mouth agape. “Sorry, should I not have…?” Dan sighs and throws up his hands in defeat; Arin leans around him to tell Suzy, “He was _incredible._ He took it like a fucking champ.”

“Did I really?” Danny giggles. 

Arin raises his eyebrows. “Are you kidding me? I wasn’t expecting you to be so fucking _eager,_ holy fuck.” 

“Oh my god,” Suzy squeals, fanning herself. “Oh, you two are gonna _kill_ me.”

“Thanks again, Suze,” Dan says, pointedly looking down at his plate instead of making eye contact. “For, uh, sharing.”

Suzy grabs his wrist and squeezes. “Oh, Danny,” she cries. “Thank _you_ for making him so happy.”

“Don’t make me cry into my waffles,” Arin protests. “Waffles taste awful with tears.”

//

The last few bars of the song play out. Dan’s vocals are finished for this particular track; he dances by Arin, bubbling with performance energy. Arin grabs Dan by the cape, startling him, and kisses him softly, tenderly on the mouth as the final notes of the song play out. The crowd roars; Arin had half-forgotten they were even there.

Arin turns back to the mic, fanning himself and grinning. “I just got kissed by Danny Sexbang,” he giggles. The crowd roars all over again.  
  
“No,” Dan corrects him once the roar dies down, but he’s grinning too. “Uh, incorrect.”

“Incorrect?” Arin asks.

“Yeah, incorrect,” Dan affirms. _“You_ kissed _me.”_   He laughs at Arin’s eyeroll. “Yeah. That’s right.” He strikes a cocky pose and flashes the crowd a cheeky grin. “When you _get_ kissed _by_ Danny Sexbang, you fuckin’ _know.”_

“Oh?” Arin quirks an eyebrow, beckoning him in. “You, uh, you wanna demonstrate?”

“Oh my gosh, guys, should I? Do you think?” Dan asks the crowd, tapping a finger on his chin like he’s thinking it over. The crowd of course screams the affirmative. “Yeah? Just for educational purposes?” Dan glances over at Arin, and laughs as Arin comically nods in overenthusiastic consent. “Alright, fine. Get over here.”

Dan grabs Arin by the face and kisses him hard. It’s immediately open-mouthed and slightly over-the-top for the fans’ sake - Dan seems absolutely determined to make sure they know he’s kissing Arin with tongue, as if it could possibly be missed - but incredibly satisfying nonetheless. Dan is pulling out all the stops, kissing Arin as expertly as he can right on stage, right in front of thousands of people. Arin’s heart is about to beat out of his chest.

After a few moments of silence, Dan grabs the microphone and tries to reset. “Our next song is one of my personal favorites off that album, it’s…” 

Arin catches Danny’s eye and points to his own chest. ‘I love you,’ he mouths, then points at Dan. 

“...Robots in Need of - holy shit,” Dan giggles. “That was fuckin’ adorable. I love you too.” He laces his fingers with Arin’s. “Robots in Need of Disguise, featuring Arin Hanson on vocals! Give this man some love, Detroit!” 

The crowd’s response is almost deafening. Dan leans in and kisses him again, quickly, soft and sweet, right before his vocals start, and in those few seconds everything in Arin’s life feels absolutely perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (EDIT 1/4/2020: OH MY GOD OKAY!! you guys win lmfaoo!!! even though he doesn't keep kosher, i was so sick of getting comments about it - the bacon is now hash browns!!!)
> 
> anyway - THANK YOU to everyone who's been here reading this all this time since i posted the first three chapters in one day, who's been here from any point from the beginning until now, and anyone reading this after it's posted!
> 
> and SUPER SPECIAL THANKS to pringlesaremydivision for being my beta on these last few chapters!!!!!

**Author's Note:**

> please, please, PLEASE leave a comment if you read this!!


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